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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



THE LOUISIANA BOOK: 



SELECTIONS 



FROM THK 



LITERATURE OF THE STATE. 



EDITED, WITH A PREFACE, AND 
WITH BIOGRAPHICAL, CRITICAL, AND EXPLANATORY NOTES. BY 



THOMAS M'CALEB, 

AUTIIOK OF "ANTHONY MELSRAVE," ETC. 



ILLUSTRATED WITH PORTRAITS. 



PlVlAY i J^4 r ° 

Of WA S« ,r 



(,3£%. 



NEW ORLEANS: 
E. F. STRAITGHAN, PUBLISHER. 

1894. 



Copyright, 1894, 
By THOMAS M'CALEB. 



Press of J. J. Little & Co. 
Astor Place, New York 



4. 




,v 



PREFACE. 

The singular fact that the literature of Louisiana speaks in both 
the French and English tongue has generally been unnoticed by 
historians of American letters ; and local scholars are no doubt justi- 
fied in their complaint that the works of our writers, in French 
especially, do not enjoy that wide recognition which they deserve. 

I would remain silent on this point did I not feel obliged to offer 
some explanation for having done very scant justice to the French 
portion, the oldest if not most deserving portion, of our literature. 
Two circumstances, indeed, have made it desirable, if not necessary, 
to limit the scope of the present book to productions by our English 
authors. In the first place, I was not able to procure, within the 
time which I assigned to myself for the completion of this volume, 
translations of passages from hundreds of worthy French produc- 
tions ; and in the next place, I deemed it impracticable to make 
bilingual a work that is intended for general circulation in Louisiana : 
for while our Creoles (and by that term I mean native Louisi- 
anians of the Latin race) generally read with equal facility both 
English and their own maternal tongue, our people of Northern 
extractions know, as a rule, no language but their own ; and it is to 
them this book looks for its largest audience. 

It affords me pleasure, for all that, to be able to give representa- 
tion to a few of our best-known French authors. I have procured, 
for instance, a good translation of La Chambre cV 'Amour* by Albert 
Delpit, whom Louisiana, his mother State, claims as her greatest 
novelist, despite the fact that his fame was won in France. I also 
present in English dress, and for the first time, an episode j by Dr. 
Alfred Mercier, who has contributed with honor to every important 
department of literature except history. I must further call the 
reader's attention to an excellent translation of a short story % D y 
Edouard Dessommes, a bold literary colorist, to whose genius 
Auguste Yacquerie, the accomplished French poet, has paid a hand- 
some tribute. 

It should be borne in mind, however, that I have not included 
scores of our Anglo-Louisiana writers and orators who are quite 
as deserving as some on whom my choice has fallen. More- 

* Vide p. 342. f Le Banquet, vide p. 373. \ Madeleine et Berthe, vide p. 400. 



iv PREFACE. 

over, I have classed as Louisianians many authors whom other 
States and countries might claim with equal, perhaps, in some 
instances, with more justice. It is, however, hard to decide ofttimes 
what must be the criterion in the decision between States or coun- 
tries making such claims; though it would seem that the prefer- 
ence should be given to the place of one's birth. I have not merely 
considered whether the authors represented in this book generally 
regarded themselves as Louisianians, but also whether their repu- 
tation in literature was, in whole or in part, made during their 
residence in the State. 



In the construction of my volume, I have been guided, on the 
whole, by the rules Lord Bacon lays down for the compilation of a 
book of " Institutions " of the law.* " Principally," he says, " it ought 
to have two properties — the one a perspicuous and clear order or 
method, and the other an universal latitude or comprehension, that the 
student may have a little prenotion of everything." 

I have divided my subject into five parts, to wit : Historical 
Sketches, Specimens of Oratory, Essays, Fiction, and Poetry. In my 
endeavor, however, to make the divisions logical, I have encountered 
the main difficulties of a librarian who seeks to classify his books 
under special departments. True, I have found little or no difficulty 
in arranging selections under Part IY., denominated Fiction, and 
under Part Y., denominated Poetry, and subdivided into two sec- 
tions, respectively styled Dramatic and Miscellaneous. But, on the 
other hand, some few selections which I have placed under Part 
II. and Part III. might, with some reason, be assigned to Part I. 
I have chosen, moreover, for Historical Sketches only such subjects 
as belong, directly or indirectly, to the history of Louisiana. Part I. 
and Part II. might also as reasonably, perhaps, be included with 
Part III., under the general heading Essays, if I limit the definition 
of that word to mean prose productions treating briefly of a given 
subject. Yet, though I cannot in general take an elastic view of the 
term, I have not scrupled to class as essays such passages by our 
writers as treat of a definite subject in one or many of its aspects. 
And I am responsible for the titles prefixed to such selections, as 
well as to many others that come under Part I. and Part II. More- 
over, in subdividing Part III. into Essays— Controversial, and Essays 
— Mixed, I have not restricted the mixed essay to mean an interme- 
diary between the didactic and the personal essay, a distinction on 

* Proposal for Amending the Laws of England. Bacon's Works, Bonn's edition, 
vol. i. p. G69. 



PREFACE. V 

which Bulwer-Lytton insists ; * but I have considered the word in its 
more ordinary and popular sense. In general, whenever I was 
doubtful as to the character of a piece, I have not regarded abstract 
definitions so much as the style of each selection, and the expressed 
or apparent intent of its author. 

Omissions in the original texts are in this volume noted by 
dots ; f and words introduced for the sake of continuit}^ are en- 
closed in brackets, \ as are also the biographical, critical, and 
explanatory notes added by me. On the other hand, the notes of 
the authors are all printed without brackets, and may be found in 
the original texts. 

It remains for me to express my gratitude to Professor Kobert 
Sharp and Mr. John Dimitry, for having favored me with many 
suggestions that I have utilized to advantage in the preparation of 
this work. I wish also to acknowledge the courtesy of several pub- 
lishing houses for having permitted me to include extracts from mate- 
rials on which they respectively own the copyrights. My thanks are 
especially due to Messrs. Harper & Brothers, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 
Charles Scribner's Sons, Houghton, Mifflin, & Company, D. Appleton 
& Compan} r , Ticknor & Company, the J. B. Lippincott Company, and 
the D. Lothrop Company. 

T. M'C. 

New Orleans, April 10, 1894. 

* Caxtoniana. Harper Bros., 1864, p. 146. 
t Thus, .... % Thus . [ ]• 



CONTENTS. 

PART I. 

HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

PAGE 

Louisiana and hee Laws Henry J. Leovy 1 

The Tree of the Dead Charles Gayarre 12 

A Sketch of the History of Acadia, 
from the Settlement of the Col- 
ony to the Dispersion of the 
Inhabitants Alcee Fortier 15 

The Revolution of 1768 in Louisiana. 

and its Consequences John R. Ficklen 23 

The South's First Crop of Sugar Charles Gayarre 41 

The Battle of New Orleans George W. Cable 43 

The Festivity after the Victory . . . .Alexander Walker 51 

The New Orleans Bench and Bar 

in 1823 Charles Gayarre 54 

The Oaks John Augustin 71 

The Failure of the Confederate 
Government in its Diplomacy 
with Foreign Nations, especially 
with England and France Alfred Roman 88 

The Battle of Shiloh, and the Part 
Played therein by Henry Wat- 
kins Allen, Ex-Governor of 
Louisiana Sarah A. Dorsey 93 

The Battle of Chancellorsville Napier Bartlett 98 



Yin CONTEXTS. 

PAGE 

The Disbandment of the Washington 

Artillery in 1805 William Miller Owen 102 

The Confederate Administration and 

its Downfall Alfred Roman 107 

Ulysses S. Grant and Radicalism. . . .Richard Taylor 110 



PART II. 
SPECIMENS OP ORATORY. 

Against the Eligibility of a Citizen 
Born outside of the United 
States, to the Governorship or 
Lieutenant-Governorship of Lou- 
isiana John R. Grymes 115 

The Sons of New England Seargent S. Prentiss 118 

Appeal in Behalf of the Famine- 
stricken Irish Seargent S. Prentiss 121 

Seargent S. Prentiss Henry A. Bullard 124 

Virtue the Corner-Stone of Republi- 
can Government Judah P. Benjamin 128 

The Court a Temple of Justice- Randell Hunt 135 

Against the Policy of Impassiveness. Pierre Soule 137 

The Highway of Nations Pierre Sonle 140 

Important Public Services of Henry 

Clay Theodore H. M'Caleb .... 114 

Collegiate Education Christian Roselius 149 

Effects of Ignorance among the 

Masses Christian Roselins 152 

On the Question of the Annexation 

of Cuba to the United States . . .Judah P. Benjamin 154 

Negroes as Property Judah P. Benjamin 150 

The Confederate Seal Thomas J. Semmes 100 



x CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

The Early Literature of Spain J. D. B. de Bow 239 

Petrarch and Laura Richard Henry Wilde 244 

Macbeth William Preston Johnston . 247 

Cervantes and the Don Quixote . . . .Anguste d'Avezac 263 

Le Sage and the Gil Blas Augnste d'Avezac 266 

Bernardin's Paul and Virginia Anguste d'Avezac 268 

La Fontaine Charles Gayarre 270 

The Origin of Myth William Preston Johnston. 276 

The Book-Men T. Wharton Collens 286 

I) celling Etienne Maznreau 297 

The Judiciary Franc, ois-Xavier Martin . . . 299 

The Model Judge Gustavus Schmidt 301 

Our Illusions William H. Holcombe .... 310 

An Officer's Duties in Time of War. P. G. T. Beauregard 318 

Magicians and Feather Dusters Julia K. Wetherill Baker . 320 

Queen Anne Fronts and Mary Anne 

Backs Martha R. Field 325 

PART IV. 

FICTION. 

The Story of Izanachi and Izanani. Frank McGloin 333 

Esther's Choice Lafcadio Hearn 338 

The Mysterious Grotto Albert Delpit 342 

Le Tombeau Blanc John Dimitry 347 

The Banquet Alfred Mercier 373 

The Devotion of Marcelite Grace King 376 

On the Watch Charles Patton Dimitry . . . 389 

A Morning-Glory M. E. M. Davis 393 

Madeleine and Bertha Edward Dessommes 400 

Lamentations of Jeremiah Johnson. .Ruth McEnery Stuart. .. . 406 



CONTENTS. ix 

PAGE 

George Washington and Robert E. 

Lee Benjamin M. Palmer 165 

The End of Sectionalism E. John Ellis 168 

Discovery of the Mississippi Valley. .Randall L. Gibson 169 

Grace in Woman Benjamin M. Palmer 172 

Chivalry Emmanuel de la Moriniere. 174 

The Origins of Some of the Colonial 

Families of Louisiana Charles Patton Dimitry . . . 180 

PAET III. 

ESSAYS. 
SECTION I. CONTROVERSIAL. 

The Batture Case Edward Livingston 185 

Secession and Coercion B. J. Sage 192 

Mr. Cable's Freedman's Case in 

Equity Charles Gayarre 198 

Mr. Cable, the " Negrophilist " B — z 203 

A Plea for the Modern Languages. .John R. Ficklen 206 

PART III. 

ESSAYS. 
SECTION II. MIXED. 

The Humming-Bird John J. Audubon 215 

The Wood Thrush John J. Audubon 218 

The Mocking-Bird John J. Audubon 220 

The Relation between the Litera- 
tures of Greece and Hindostan. .Alexander Dimitry 222 

The Period of Childhood and Youth 

among the Anglo-Saxons Robert Sharp 226 



CONTENTS. x i 

PART V. 

POETRY. 

SECTION I. DEAMATIC. 

The Martyr Patriots; or, Louisiana 

IK 1769 T. Wharton Collens 421 

Parrhasius; or, Thriftless Ambition . Espy W. H. Williams .... 473 

PART V. 

POETRY. 

SECTION II. MISCELLANEOUS. 

My Life is like the Summer Rose . . .Richard Henry Wilde 491 

The Poet's Lament Richard Henry Wilde 492 

To the Mocking-Bird Richard Henry Wilde 493 

Adieu to Innisfail Richard cFAlton Williams 494 

Sister of Charity Richard d < Alton WilliamB m 

The First and Second Birth James T. Smith 493 

The Mother's Song James t. Smith 500 

Mary Queen of Scots' Farewell William Preston Johnston. 502 

Edgar Allan Poe j o]in Dimitry 504 

The Exile to his Wife Joseph Brennan 505 

Lord, Keep my Memory Green! Anna Peyre Dinnies 507 

The Wife Anna Peyre Dinnies 509 

Powers's Greek Slave Anna Peyre Dinnies 510 

The Wild Lily and the Passion- 
Flower Adrien Rouquette 511 

To Nature, my Mother Adrien Rouquette 513 

To a Miniature John AY. Overall 511 

The Bards John w Overall 516 

At the Theatre Henry Lynden Flash 519 



xii CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

What She Brought me Henry Lynden Flash 521 

Who Can Tell ? Henry Lynden Flash 523 

The Bonnie Blue Flag Harry McCarthy 524 

My Maryland James E. Randall 526 

John Pelham James E. Randall 529 

In Memoriam John Dimitry 531 

Zollicoffer Henry Lynden Flash 533 

" Stonewall " Jackson Henry Lynden Flash 534 

Lines to the Memory of Father Turgis.T. Wharton Collens 535 

0, Tempora ! 0, Mores ! J. Dickson Brims 537 

A Ehyme of Modern Venice Charles Patton Dimitry . . . 540 

The Backwoodsman's Daughter Mary Ashley Townsend. . . 542 

Creed Mary Ashley Townsend . . . 547 

To One Beloved Mary Ashley Townsend . . . 549 

Lake Pontchartrain Mary Ashley Townsend . . . 550 

The Picture William H. Holcombe .... 551 

Pere Dagobert M. E. M. Davis 552 

Throwing the Wanga M. E. M. Davis 556 

My Love went Sailing o'er the Sea.M. E. M. Davis 560 

Silence M. E. M. Davis 561 

Counsel M. E. M. Davis 562 

For Thee, my Love, for Thee Mark F. Bigney 563 

I've Kissed her in a Dream Mark F. Bigney 565 

Hagar Eliza J. Nicholson 566 

Waiting Eliza J. Nicholson 571 

Only a Heart Eliza J. Nicholson 572 

Dreams of the Past E. N. Ogden 574 

The Light of Thine Eyes E. N. Ogden 577 

The House Immortal Eichard Nixon 578 

Sir William Thomson's Aerolith Eichard Nixon 579 

Swinburne Eichard Nixon 580 

When All is Said Julia K. Wetherill Baker . 581 



INDEX OF AUTHORS. 

WITH TITLES OF THE SELECTIONS FROM THEIR PRODUCTIONS. 

Audubon, John J. • PAGE 

The Humming-Bird, 215 

The Wood Thrush, 218 

The Mocking-Bird, 220 

Augustin, John. 

The Oaks, 71 

Baker, Julia K. Wetherill. 

Magicians and Feather Dusters, 320 

When All is Said, 581 

Bartlett, Napier. 

The Battle of Chancellorsville, 98 

Beauregard, P. G. T. 

An Officer's Duties in Time of War, .... . . 318 

Benjamin. Judah P. 

Virtue the Corner-Stone of Republican Government, 128 

On the Question of the Annexation of Cuba to the United States, . . 154 

Negroes as Property, 156 

Bigney, Mark F. 

For Thee, my Love, for Thee, 56:J 

I've Kissed Her in a Dream, 565 

Brennan, Joseph. 

The Exile to his Wife, 505 

Bruns, J. Dickson. 

0, Terapora ! 0, Mores ! 537 

Bullard, Henry A. 

Seargent S. Prentiss, . 124 

B z. 

Mr. Cable, the "Negrophilist," 203 

Cable, George W. 

The Battle of New Orleans 43 

Collens, T. Wharton. 

The Book-Men, 286 

The Martyr Patriots ; or, Louisiana in 1769, 421 

Lines to the Memory of Father Turgis, 535 



xiv INDEX OF AUTHORS. 

D'AVEZAC, AUGUSTE. PAGE 

Cervantes and the Don Quixote, 263 

Le Sage and the Gil Bias, 266 

Bernardin's Paul and Virginia, 268 

Davis, M. E. M. 

A Morning-Glory, 393 

Pere Dagobert, 552 

Throwing the Wanga, 556 

My Love went Sailing o'er the Sea, 560 

Silence, 561 

Counsel, 562 

DeBow, J. D. B. 

The Early Literature of Spain, ......... 239 

De La Moriniere, Emmanuel. 

Chivalry, 1^4 

Delpit, Albert. 

The Mysterious Grotto, .342 

Dessommes, Edward. 

Madeleine and Bertha, . 400 

Dimitey, Alexander. 

The Relation between the Literatures of Greece and Hindostan, . . 222 

Dimitey, Charles Patton. 

The Origins of Some of the Colonial Families of Louisiana, . . . 180 

On the Watch, 389 

A Rhyme of Modern Venice, 540 

Dimitry, John. 

Le Tombeau Blanc, 347 

Edgar Allan Poe, 504 

In Memoriam, ............ 531 

Dinnies, Anna Peyre. 

Lord, Keep my Memory Green ! 507 

The Wife 509 

Powers's Greek Slave, • • • • 510 

Dorsey, Sarah A. 

The Battle of Shiloh and the Part Played therein by Henry Watkins Allen, 

Ex-Governor of Louisiana, 93 

Ellis, E. John. 

The End of Sectionalism, 168 

Ficklen, John R. 

The Revolution of 1768 in Louisiana, and its Consequences, ... 23 

A Plea for the Modern Languages, 206 



INDEX OF AUTHORS. xv 

Field, Martha R. page 

Queen Anne Fronts and Mary Anne Backs, 325 

Flash, Henry Lynden. 

At the Theatre, 519 

What She Brought me, 521 

Who Can Tell ? 523 

Zollicoffer, .............. 533 

" Stonewall " Jackson 534 

FORTIER, ALCEE. 

A Sketch of the History of Acadia, from the Settlement of the Colony to the 
Dispersion of the Inhabitants, 15 

Gayarre, Charles. 

The Tree of the Dead, 12 

The South's First Crop of Sugar, 41 

The New Orleans Bench and Bar in 1823, 54 

Mr. Cable's FreedmarCs Cam in Eqwity, 198 

La Fontaine, 270 

Gibson, Randall L. 

Discovery of the Mississippi Valley, 169 

Grymes, John R. 

Against the Eligibility of a Citizen Born outside of the United States, to the 

Governorship or Lieutenant-Governorship of Louisiana, ... 115 

Hearn, Lafcadio. 

Esther's Choice, 338 

Holcombe, William H. 

Our Illusions, 310 

The Picture, ............ 551 

Hunt, Randell. 

The Court a Temple of Justice, ' . . 135 

Johnston, William Preston. 

Macbeth, 247 

The Origin of Myth, 276 

Mary Queen of Scots' Farewell, 502 

King, Grace. 

The Devotion of Marcelite, 376 

Leovy, Henry J. 

Louisiana and her Laws, 1 

Livingston, Edward. 

The Batture Case, 185 



xvi INDEX OF AUTHORS. 

Martin, Francois-Xavier. page 

The Judiciary, 299 

Mazureau, FjTIENNE. 

Duelling, 297 

M'Caleb, Theodore H. 

Important Public Services of Henry Clay, 144 

McCarthy, Harry. 

The Bonnie Blue Flag, 524 

McGloin, Frank. 

The Story of Izanachi and Izanani, 333 

Mercier, Alfred. 

The Banquet, 373 

Nicholson, Eliza J. 

Hagar, 566 

Waiting, 571 

Only a Heart, 572 

Nixon, Richard. 

The House Immortal, ........... 578 

Sir William Thomson's Aerolith, 579 

Swinburne, 580 

Ogden, R. N. 

Dreams of the Past, 574 

The Light of Thine Eyes, 577 

Overall, John W. 

To a Miniature, 514 

The Bards, • 516 

Owen, William Miller. 

The Disbandment of the Washington Artillery in 1865, .... 102 

Palmer, Benjamin M. 

George Washington and Robert E. Lee, 165 

Grace in Woman, 17* 

Prentiss, Seargent S. 

The Sons of New England, 118 

Appeal in Behalf of the Famine-stricken Irish, 121 

Randall, James R. 

My Maryland, 526 

JohnPelham, 529 



INDEX OF AUTHORS. xvn 

Roman, Alfred. page 
The Failure of the Confederate Government in its Diplomacy with Foreign 

Nations, especially with England and France, 88 

The Confederate Administration and its Downfall, 107 

Roselius, Christian. 

Collegiate Education, 149 

Effects of Ignorance among the Masses, 152 

RoUQUETTE, ADRIEN. 

The Wild Lily and the Passion-Flower, 511 

To Nature, my Mother, 513 

Sage, B. J. 

Secession and Coercion, 192 

Schmidt, Gustavus. 

The Model Judge, 301 

Semmes, Thomas J. 

The Confederate Seal, 160 

Sharp, Robert. 

The Period of Childhood and Youth among the Anglo-Saxons, . . . 226 

Smith, James T. 

The First and Second Birth, 498 

The Mother's Song, 500 

Soule, Pierre. 

Against the Policy of Impassiveness, 137 

The Highway of Nations, 140 

Stuart, Ruth McEnery. 

Lamentations of Jeremiah Johnson, 406 

Taylor, Richard. 

Ulysses S. Grant and Radicalism, ........ 110 

Townsend, Mary Ashley. 

The Backwoodsman's Daughter, 542 

Creed, 547 

To One Beloved, 549 

Lake Pontehartrain, . 550 

Walker, Alexander. 

The Festivity after the Victory, 51 

Wilde, Richard Henry. 

Petrarch and Laura, 244 

My Life is like the Summer Rose, 491 

2 



xv iii INDEX OF AUTHORS. 

PAGE 

492 
The Poet's Lament 

493 
To the Mocking-Bird, 

Williams, Espy W. H. 

Parrhasius ; or, Thriftless Ambition, 

Williams, Richard d'Alton. 

Adieu to Innisfail 

496 
Sister of Charity, 



PART I. 



HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 



LOUISIANA AND HER LAWS.* 

BY HENRY J. LEOVY. 

[Henry Jefferson Leovy was born in Augusta, Ga., May 17, 1826. At a tender 
age he was brought by his family to Louisiana. In 1849 he was admitted to the bar of the 
State. He owned and published for many years, with the late P. E. Bonford and others, 
the New Orleans Delta, which was "seized" by General Butler in 1862. Mr. Leovy 
served with gallantry in the Confederate army (1861-'65). In 1870 he was elected City 
Attorney of New Orleans. He is one of the most erudite and prominent lawyers of 
Louisiana.] 

We propose giving as briefly as possible an outline of the legal 
history of Louisiana. We would premise for the benefit of the unini- 
tiated that there are two grand systems of law known to the civilized 
world. The one, the Common law, composed of the Customary and 
Statutory law of England, is now the law of that country and of 
twenty-eight of the States of this Union ;f the other, the Corpus 
juris Civilis, or Civil law, is now taught and obeyed not pnly in 
France, Germany, Plolland, and Scotland, but in the islands of the 
Indian Ocean, and on the banks of the Mississippi and the St. Law- 
rence. In this we see exemplified the great D'Aguesseau's remark, 
that " the grand destinies of Rome are not yet accomplished ; she 
reigns throughout the world by her reason, after having ceased to 
reign by her authority." The Roman or Civil law is founded upon 
the royal constitutions of its first kings, on the Twelve Tables, the 
statutes enacted by the Senate and the People, the Pretorial edicts, 
the opinions of learned lawyers and the Imperial Decrees. From 
these numerous sources was formed an immense reservoir of both 
useful and useless laws, a part of which were first codified by Theo- 
dosius, then the whole under Justinian, in 533, by Tribonian and 
others. The body of law thus compiled and finished consists of the 
Institutes in four books, the Pandects in fifty, the Imperial Code in 
twelve books, and the Novels or New Constitutions. 

It is the general belief that this old Roman law, modified and 
polished by the wisdom of French and Spanish enactments, is the 
existing system of jurisprudence in Louisiana. This opinion, though 
true in the main, needs some qualification. Our laws are a texture 

* [Reprinted from The New Orleans Book (1851).] \ [1851.] 



2 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

composed of the best materials, from both the English Common and 
the Roman Civil law. Other States and other nations have contented 
themselves with adopting, without change or modification, either the 
one or the other of these systems. Our plan is the interweaving of 
the two, the mingling of both as the colors mingle in the rainbow, 
and so imperceptibly, that, like the verge of the horizon and sea, none 
but the most experienced eyes can discern the distinctive line between 
them. 

Each of the two grand systems has its imperfections, as well as 
virtues. The Civil law is defective in its public, the Common law in 
its private relations. There are but few writers, acquainted with the 
relative merits of the Common and Civil law, that do not unhesi- 
tatingly declare that in all the relations between man and man the 
Roman law is infinitely superior to the English law ; while in all the 
public relations — in all that exists between government and man, 
between society as a whole and man as a part — in all that concerns 
the protection of the property and liberty of the individual, there has 
been in no country, nor does there anywhere exist, a system at all 
comparable to the Common law. Brown, speaking of Rome in his 
work on the Civil law, remarks that " it was the peculiar glory of the 
nation which subdued the world to furnish mankind with a code of 
laws containing the most perfect system of justice and equity, between 
man a\ul man, that has ever been produced by human invention/' 
But, says Montesquieu, " Liberty was in the centre, and slavery in 
all its extremities, 1 ' and adds the writer first quoted from, " In the 
criminal law, in that great palladium of liberty, the jury, we are 
immeasurably in advance of the Roman code; and here, upon the 
whole, is the glory of the English system." Kent, too, after express- 
ing his preference for many parts of the Civil law, concludes that " in 
everything which concerns civil and political liberty, the Civil law 
cannot be compared to the free spirit of the English and American 
Common law. 11 None were more aware of the relative merits and 
defects of the two systems than the American and French juris- 
consults who found themselves in Louisiana on its adoption into the 
Union. The United States, by the act of 1804, left to the people of 
Louisiana the task of legislating for themselves, and gave them the 
power to make such changes in their system of laws as they might in 
their wisdom deem necessary. They found the Civil law with all its 
unwieldy incumbrances harnessed upon them. They felt that great 
and many difficulties would arise by engrafting new principles on the 
political system of the Union. They knew that by adopting the Civil 
law, without amendment, they would be introducing into the Union a 
jingling and discordant element. To so model this system as to make 



LOUISIANA AND HER LAWS. 3 

it harmonize with the laws of the Federal Government and neighbor- 
ing States, was a difficult task. But the legal minds of that day were 
strong, nor were they bound to or prejudiced in favor of or against 
any system. They took a view of the work before them from a more 
elevated point than that selected by the strictly Common or Civil 
lawyer. Hence, they produced, from the more abundant material 
before them, a code of laws that will vie with the most perfect system 
the world has yet produced. Almost the very first act made by these 
legislators, enacted in 1805, declared that all crimes, offences, and mis- 
demeanors should be taken, intended, and construed according to, and 
in conformity with, the Common law of England; then followed, in 
1812, the framing and adoption of the State constitution, which was 
almost in every respect similar to those adopted by the neighboring 
States, most of whose principles were borrowed from the Common 
law of England. Here, then, in our fundamental and legislative enact- 
ments, in all the public relations we recognized and adopted the Com- 
mon law, and, as may be inferred, almost everything relating to the 
private relations which had already been engrafted on the country 
was suffered to remain. It is true that some excrescences were pruned, 
some redundancies and remnants of the old Roman tyranny in the 
domestic relations were lopped off, but the whole system worked the 
better and gave more satisfaction on account of these changes. 

It will thus be seen by the Bar of other States that, though 'we 
consider ourselves governed by the Civil law, there is much in common 
between themselves and us, and that our laws approximate nearer to 
the Common law than is generally imagined. Nor is this all. No one 
who has at all studied the gradual formation of our system can have 
failed to observe the leaning of our Supreme Court for years past 
towards the Common law. This is not only perceptible but the com- 
mon remark of our Bar. After all, the form of proceedings in our 
courts is the most marked boundary between our law and that of our 
neighbors. We have often heard Common law lawyers express their 
sympathy for those Romans who lived before the age of Justinian, 
because, though the people were possessed of certain rights, they 
could not of themselves obtain them, because of the mystery and 
mummery of the proceedings with which no ordinary individual could 
become acquainted. They never for a moment reflect, that among 
themselves the same odious objection exists, and that their people are 
as much in need of an interpreter as were the old Romans with whom 
they so much sympathize. Our system is not open to this objection. 
Our pleadings almost equal in simplicity those of the old Saxons in 
their Witenagemote, where the parties simply related to the Court 
the tale of their grievances, without adorning or varnishing, without 



4 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

technicality or equivocation. In this great distinctive feature, then, 
we flatter ourselves, we are in advance of both our neighbors and the 
Federal Government ; but, at the same time, we think we can perceive 
in them an inclination to simplify their judicial proceedings as we 
have done. 

Besides this there is more of the old Roman law in the very foun- 
dation of the English jurisprudence than the Common law advocate is 
willing to admit. There can be no doubt that the Roman law was 
early introduced into Britain while that country was in possession of 
the Romans. Chancellor Kent thinks the Civil law was administered 
there by the illustrious Papinian, aided by Paulus and Ulpian. The 
elegant Selden is of the same opinion, as is also Crabbe. It must, then, 
have existed in Britain a long time ; and laws — particularly such as 
the Roman laws — thus early introduced and thus long existing, must 
leave an impress, not easily obliterated, on the manners and customs 
of a people. Crabbe acknowledges many remnants of the Civil law 
still existing in England. Again, no three men more aided in the 
formation of the Common law, than did Bracton, Britton and Fleta ; 
their opinions were law, their dicta commands. 

Now, these great jurisconsults all lived and wrote after the twelfth 
century ; and it must be remembered that it was in 1135, at Amalfi, 
that the Roman Pandects were discovered, which have greatly influ- 
enced those writers. Brown, in his work on the Civil law, declares 
unhesitatingly that those authors shine in the borrowed plumes of the 
Roman writers. And, besides this, we all know that ever since the time 
of Stephen, over all matters within the jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical 
and Chancery courts, and over all matters military and maritime, the 
Civil law has always obtained. Kent says, " It now exerts a very consid- 
erable influence upon our municipal law, and particularly on those parts 
of it which are of equity and admiralty jurisdiction, or fall within the 
cognizance of the surrogate's or consistorial courts." The fact, then, 
that within the sacred precincts of the Common law many seeds of 
the Civil are found ; that while the tendencies of the Common law are 
silently leaning towards us, we are in our decisions and laws inclining 
towards it, leads irresistibly to the conclusion that ere long, perfected 
by the hands of able judges and jurists, one system of laws — not 
Roman — not English, but American, will extend and panoply itself, 
like the blue arch of heaven, over the whole American continent. 

We have, we fear, too long indulged in a general view of the 
philosophy of our law ; we will now discuss the subject proper of 
this article and briefly touch upon the history of our law. 

As is well known, the Mississippi River was discovered as early 
as 1541, by Hernando de Soto. lie had been sent by Charles V. of 



LOUISIANA AND HER LAWS. 5 

Spain to conquer Florida, which having done, and being tempted by 
extravagant tales of its wealth, he extended his travels far into the 
interior of Arkansas. 

The French, in 1673, having become permanently settled in Can- 
ada, made many excursions to the wilds of the West. Among others 
was one headed by a priest known as Father Marquette, and a com- 
panion named Joliet. Hearing, during their excursion, of a mighty 
river called Meschacebe (Father of Waters) by the Indians, they deter- 
mined to visit it before ending their journey. Engaging four Indian 
guides, they with some difficulty reached the Meschacebe on the 7th 
July, 1673. 

In 1678 Robert Chevalier de la Salle offered his services to the 
Governor of Canada, promising to explore the Mississippi to its 
mouth, on condition that he should be provided with the proper and 
necessary means. Obtaining the assistance of Colbert and of the Prince 
of Conti, he succeeded in acquiring the needed means from Louis XIY. 
He reached the Mississippi in 1082, and for his protection founded the 
now flourishing city of St. Louis. He explored this mighty river to 
its mouth, and in accordance with the then custom, claimed, in the 
name of France, by right of discovery, the whole of the vast valley 
through which the river flowed. He took possession of it with the 
usual formalities, and named it, in honor of his king — Louisiana. 

In 1084 La Salle made an attempt to colonize Louisiana; but, 
landing at the Bay of St. Bernard, through the mismanagement of 
the naval commander he failed, and with his failure lost his life. 
During his stay at St. Bernard — near Matagorda — he took formal 
possession of the country in the name of France. Through this act 
France always claimed that Louisiana extended as far as the Rio 
Grande. La Salle was killed in 1087. tlis death was a romantic one, 
but our space will not admit of a description. From this time to 1797 
Louisiana was forgotten ; but France in that year, having concluded 
the Peace of Ryswick, directed her serious attention to the subject 
of its colonization. DTberville was sent to renew the explorations 
commenced by La Salle. He left his brothers Sauville and Bienville 
with a small company at the Balize, and returned to France. After 
succeeding in establishing a small settlement in Louisiana, he died at 
Havana in 1706. 

France having become again involved in war, and not being able 
to devote proper attention to this new colony, sold in 1712 the entire 
country to Antoine de Crozat, for the term of sixteen years. The 
Government retained only the prerogative of sovereignty. Crozat 
failed in his enterprise, and, after ruining himself and his friends, 
surrendered, in 1717, all his rights and privileges. Crozat was imme- 



6 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

diately followed by the Mississippi Company. They obtained from 
the French Government a charter to continue for twenty-five years, 
granting them every possible power, reserving the empty title 
of sovereign power. Louisiana was then a part of the Diocese of 
Quebec. 

In 1718 Bienville, feeling the need of a metropolis, selected the site 
now covered by New Orleans. 

In 1722 Louisiana was divided into nine cantons — New Orleans, 
Biloxi, Mobile, Alabama, Natchez, Natchitoches, Yazoo, Arkansas, and 
Illinois. Most of these cantons were named from the respective 
Indian tribes that inhabited them. During the time the Mississippi 
Company held this territory, many bloody battles were fought between 
the Indians and the whites, which resulted in their almost complete 
subjugation. 

The Mississippi Company, having sustained great loss, concluded in 
1732 to abandon their enterprise, and accordingly relinquished to the 
king the charter he had given them. 

( )n the 3d of November, 1762, France concluded with Spain a 
secret treaty, by which " the former ceded to the latter the part of the 
province of Louisiana which lies on the western side of the Mississippi, 
with the city of New Orleans and the island on which it stands.''' 
Antonio de Ulloa was appointed by Charles III. in 1766 to take pos- 
session, in the name of Spain, of the country ; but the people resisted, 
and Ulloa was compelled to return to Spain. In 1769 Captain-General 
O'Reilly arrived from Spain with a large force and took possession of 
the country without resistance. 

Under the dominion of France, the administration consisted of a 
Governor, an Intendant, a Commissary, and a Comptroller. In 1790 a 
Superior Council had been created, composed of two Lord-Lieutenants, 
four Counsellors, an Attorney-General, and a Recorder ; several judges 
had likewise been appointed. The Governor was ex officio President 
of the Council. This organization was set aside by O'Reilly, who 
established in the King's royal name a City Council, or, as it was 
termed, a Cabildo, for the administration of justice and preservation 
of order in the city, aided by six perpetual Regidors, all conformably 
to the second law of the Recopilacion de las Indias, among whom 
were distributed the offices of Alferez Royal, Alcalde, Mayor provin- 
cial, Alguazil Mayor, Depositary General and receiver of penas de 
camara, or fines for the use of the General Treasury. O'Reilly's proc- 
lamation, which contained a synopsis of the Spanish law (to be found 
in Schmidt's Journal of August, 1811), was made because the " limited 
knowledge which the king's new subjects possess of the Spanish laws 
might render a strict observance of them difficult ; and as every abuse 



LOUISIANA AND II ER LAWS. 7 

is contrary to the intention of his Majesty, it is thought needful and 
necessary to form an abstract or regulation drawn from the said laws, 
which may serve for instruction and elementary formulary in the 
administration of justice, and in the economical government of the 
city, until a more general knowledge of the Spanish language may 
enable every one, by the perusal aforesaid, to extend his information 
to every point thereof." This, therefore, was only temporary law, and 
soon, fulfilling its purpose, ceased to exist. But a more important 
question arises : Did O'Reilly's proclamation repeal the old French 
laws and customs ? By the Fifteenth Article of the Mississippi Com- 
pany's charter, it is said that the " Judges established in the aforesaid 
places shall be held to judge according to the Laws and Ordinances of 
the kingdom (of France) ; and to conform themselves to the Provosty 
and Viscounty of Paris." This provision is also found in Crozat's 
charter, and is in fact the foundation of the Civil law of Louisiana ; 
and of this the customs of Paris are the basis. Kow, whether these 
fundamental laws have been repealed by the proclamation of O'Reilly 
is a question yet disputed and of much interest. Mr. Jefferson seems 
to have thought the French laws but partially repealed, while Judge 
Martin in his History inclines to the contrary opinion. Happily, as 
Judge Martin observes in his History, the Spanish laws and those of 
France proceed from the same origin ; and, from the similarity, the 
transition from Spanish to French was scarcely felt by the inhabi- 
tants, and the existence or non-existence of the old French law is now 
of not the least practical importance. The Spaniards governed Louisi- 
ana from 1769 till its return to France on the :3()th November, 1803. 
France held it but twenty days, and made no change in the Spanish 
laws. The people of Louisiana, under the Spanish regime, were 
governed by the Fuero Viego, Fuero Juzco, Partidas, Recopilaciones, 
Leyes de las Indias, Autos Accordados, and Royal Schedules. To 
explain these, Spanish commentators were consulted, and the Corpus 
Juris Civilis and its commentators were resorted to, and to eke out 
any deficiency the lawyers who came from France or Hispaniola read 
Pothier, D'Aguesseau, Dumoulin, etc. El Fuero Juzco was a compila- 
tion of the rules and regulations made for Spain by its national coun- 
cils and Gothic kings as early as a.d. 693. It was the first code made 
by the Spanish nation ; it consisted of twelve volumes, and was orig- 
inally published in Latin. It was translated into Spanish in the 
thirteenth century by order of Ferdinand III. El Fuero Viego was 
published in the year 992. It is divided into five books, and contains 
the ancient customs and usages of the Spanish nation. 

The Partidas " is the most perfect system of Spanish laws, and 
may be advantageously compared with any code published in the 



8 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

most enlightened ages of the world." It is in imitation of the 
Roman Pandects, and may be considered a digest of the laws of 
Spain. It was projected by Ferdinand III., who died before finishing 
it. In 1256 Alphonso the "Wise nominated four Spanish jurisconsults, 
to whom he committed the execution of the intended work. This 
they accomplished in seven years. These laws, the result of their 
labor, they divided into seven parts, and from them, Siete Partidas, 
the work takes its name. Much of our present system of practice 
is taken from the Partidas. 

The Recopilacion of Castile was published in the year 1567, under 
the authority and supervision of Philip II. From that time to 1777 
many new editions of this work were produced. 

The Autos Accordndox were edicts and orders in Council sanctioned 
and published by virtue of a royal decree. It consists of but one 
volume. The scattered laws made for the Spanish colonies at differ- 
ent periods, were digested by Philip IV. in the same form as the 
Recopilacion of Castile, and called in 1661 the Recopilacion de las 
Indicts.* 

" The return of Louisiana under the dominion of France, and its 
transfer to the United States, did not for a moment weaken the Spanish 
laws in that province." The French, during the continuation of their 
power of twenty days, made no change, and the Government of the 
United States left the task of legislation to the people of Louisiana them- 
selves, giving to them the right to make whatever changes they might 
deem necessary in the existing system of their laws. The United 
States came in possession of Louisiana in December, 1803. In March, 
1804, an act was passed dividing the country into two territories — 
Orleans and Louisiana. In March, 1805, another act was passed provid- 
ing for the government of Louisiana and Orleans. The present Louisi- 
ana was then the Orleans Territory. The Supreme Court of said terri- 
tory was composed of three Judges, one of whom was a quorum. It 
was vested with original and appellate jurisdiction in civil and criminal 
causes. The criminal laws of Spain were repealed, and penal statutes 
adopted, the definitions and intendments of which were left to the 
Common law of England. The first territorial legislature met in 1806, 
and one of its acts was the appointing of Messrs. Brown and Lislet, two 
members of the bar, a committee to prepare a Digest of the laws then 
in existence in the territory. Instead of complying with their orders 
and digesting the laws in existence, these gentlemen made a code based 
principally on the Code Napoleon. This was adopted by the Legislature, 
and is now known as the " old Civil Code of 1808." This code did 
not repeal former laws ; " the old Civil Code only repealed such parts 

* See Preface to the American edition of the Partidas. 



LOUISIANA AND HER LAWS. 9 

of the Civil law as were contrary to or incompatible with it." It did 
not contain many and important provisions of the Spanish laAV nor any 
rules of judicial proceedings. It was therefore decided that the 
Spanish laws were to be considered as untouched when the Digest or 
Civil Code did not reach them. The Legislature, therefore, in 1819 
ordered the publication of such parts of the Partidas as were still in 
force. 

As our old and new codes are based on the Code Napoleon, it will 
not be improper to here briefly notice that work. The difficulties 
arising from the various and complicated Customs of France attracted 
the attention of early kings of France to the necessity of written 
laws. St. Louis, Philip Le Bel, and John had all vainly sought to 
effect this object. Charles VII. approached nearest to success. A 
commencement being made, the Customs were ultimately reduced to 
writing between the reigns of Louis XII. and Henry IV. In the 
course of the sixteenth century this work was improved and elabo- 
rated through the exertions of Dumoulin, Chopin, Bacquet, Pithou 
and others. Domat in the seventeenth, and Pothier in the eighteenth 
century, reduced the whole system to comparative utility. To La- 
moignon and D'Aguesseau, as also to Louis XV. and XVI., Ave are 
indebted for those Ordinances which have at once been the pride of 
France and the resort of all nations. Montesquieu fanned the flame 
that was purifying the legal atmosphere of France. After the revo- 
lution, as soon as tranquillity was restored, the French nation devoted 
itself to the thorough reformation of its laws. The result — the Code 
Napoleon — has proved the wisdom of its compilers and added to the 
happiness of the people. 

The commissioners appointed to compile the code consisted of 
Franchet, Portalis, De Premeneau and Malleville. Thirty-six laws, 
which constituted the Civil Code actually in force, having been de- 
creed, a law promulgated the 31st March, 1804, declared the union of 
all the Civil laws under the title of the " Civil Code of the French." 
This title was changed in 1807, and again in 1816, but is now gen- 
erally known as the Code Napoleon. The code has been several times 
changed since its promulgation ; and the decisions of the Court of 
Cassation reported by Dalloz and Sirey, as well as those of the sove- 
reign courts, have interpreted, applied, extended and fixed its princi- 
ples. Much assistance, too, is derived by the student by reference to 
treatises and commentaries on the subject, such as those of Duranton 
and Troplong. This code is the basis of the jurisprudence of Ger- 
many, Italy, Poland, Switzerland, and Belgium. 

In 1811 Congress raised the Territory of Orleans to the dignity of 
a State, and restored to it the name of Louisiana. In 1812 the Consti- 



10 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

tution was adopted, and in 1813 the Supreme Court was formed, con- 
sisting of three Judges, Hall, Mathews, and Derbigny. It had appellate 
jurisdiction only, and in civil cases only where the amount in dispute 
exceeded three hundred dollars. 

The " Old Code " requiring amendment, a committee, consisting of 
Messrs. Livingston, Derbigny, and Lislet, was appointed to revise it. 
The " Old Code," revised and remodelled, and called the " Civil Code 
of Louisiana," Avent into operation in 1825. Its last article repeals 
all former laws, for which it provided, and an act of 1828 abolished 
the Roman, French, and Spanish laws previously in existence, and 
also " all the articles contained in the Old Civil Code which are not 
reprinted in the New Civil Code, except Chapter III., Title 10/' The 
decision reported in Martin's Keport, N. S. vol. 6, p. 90, relating to 
the Old Code, is of course annulled by this subsequent act of the 
Legislature ; and the Supreme Court has decided that the Legislature, 
in abolishing the French and Spanish laws previously in existence, 
" did not intend to abrogate those principles of law which had been 
established or settled by the decisions of courts of justice." 

In 1840 the number of the Judges of the Supreme Court was 
increased to five. 

The Code of Practice was enacted on the 12th April, 1824, and 
promulgated 2d September, 1825. It repeals all former rules of prac- 
tice, and also those parts of the Civil Code that conflict with it. 

In 1845 our present Constitution was adopted, changing materially 
the basis of our laws, and causing a nearer approximation to the 
principles of the Common law. Though our people, from a love of 
novelty, and on account of some real defects, are already seeking a 
change, it can hardly be denied that, with all its faults, it is one of 
the best Constitutions to be found in the Union. It changed and 
greatly simplified the judiciary system, creating in place of numer- 
ous courts but three degrees of jurisdiction — the inferior courts, or 
Justices of the Peace; the District Courts; and the appellate or 
Supreme Court, consisting of one Chief Justice and three puisne 
Judges.* 

We have thus, as we promised, briefly touched upon the most 
important points in the legal history of Louisiana. It will be found 
that we have adopted mainly the Civil law. With regard to its 
merits, in concluding, we cannot better express ourselves than by 
using the elegant language of Chancellor Kent. " The whole body 

* [ The Supreme Court at present consists of one Chief Justice and four Associate 
or puisne Judges. Hon. Francis T. Nicholls is the Chief Justice, and Hons. Lynn B. 
Watkins, Samuel D. McEnery, Joseph A. Breaux, and Henry C. Miller are the puisne 
Judges.] 



LOUISIANA AND HER LAWS. 11 

of the Civil law will excite never-failing curiosity, and receive the 
homage of scholars, as a singular monument of wisdom. It fills such 
a large space in the eye of human reason ; it regulates so many inter- 
ests of man as a social, civilized being ; it embodies so much thought, 
reflection, experience, and labor ; it leads us so far into the recesses of 
antiquity ; and it has stood so long ' against the waves and weathers 
of time,' that it is impossible, while engaged in the contemplation of 
the system, not to be struck with some portion of the awe and ven- 
eration which are felt in the midst of the solitudes of a majestic 
ruin.''' 



THE TREE OF THE DEAD. 

[From History of Louisiana (1866).] 

BY CHAKLES GAYARRE. 

[Charles Etienne Arthur Gayarre, or Charles Gayarre, as he usually signs his 
name, was born in New Orleans, January 9, 1805. His family is identified with the 
history of Louisiana from its early colonial period. In youth, Gayarre studied at the 
College of Orleans. At the age of twenty, he laid before the Legislature of Louisiana a 
pamphlet in which he opposed some provisions of a criminal code that had been prepared 
by Edward Livingston at the request of the State. In 1826 he went to Philadelphia, 
and for two years read law under William Rawle, the author of a work on the Constitution 
of the United States. Having been admitted to the Pennsylvania bar, he returned to 
Louisiana, where, in due season, he received a license to practise law. In 1830 he was 
elected one of the Representatives of New Orleans in the State Legislature. In 1832 
Governor Roman appointed him Presiding Judge of the City Court of New Orleans. In 
1835 he was elected to the United States Senate ; but some months before the time when 
he was to take his seat in that body, his health became so undermined that he decided 
to visit Europe, in the hope of recovery. On his arrival in Paris, however, his physicians 
having declared that an early return to his native land would endanger his life, he 
resigned his seat in the United States Senate, and remained in Europe eight years, 
occupying his time in study and in making historical investigations. In 1844, shortly 
after his return to Louisiana, he was elected to the State Legislature, and two years later 
was reelected to that body; but on the very day of its meeting, he accepted, instead, 
the appointment of Secretary of State under Governor Johnson's administration. When 
the Know-Nothing Party was organized in Louisiana, Gayarre was induced, after much 
hesitation, to join it ; but his connection with it terminated when he learned that one of 
its canons was religious intolerance. During the Civil War, he was in sympathy with 
the Confederates. Since the war he was for some time reporter of the Supreme Court 
of his State. He writes French and English with equal skill. His History of 
Louisiana, the standard work on the subject, has won for him the title, " The Henri 
Martin of Louisiana." His style is earnest, dignified, and florid ; and in figures of 
antitheses, it compares favorably with that of the greatest historians. He is the author 
of L'Histoire de la Louisiane (1847) ; Romance of the History of Louisiana (1848) ; 
Louisiana: its Colonial History and Romance (1851) ; Louisiana: its History as a 
French Colony (1852) ; and History of the Spanish Domination in Louisiana (1854). 
These works were revised and included in three volumes in 1866 as the History of 
Louisiana, which, in 1879, was reissued in four volumes, Among his other works, are 
Philip II. of Spain (1866), Fernando de Lemos, a novel (1872), with a sequel, Aubert 
Dubayet (1882), The School for Politics, a Drama, and Dr. Bluff, a Comedy (1854).] 

In a lot situated at the corner of Orleans and Dauphine Streets, in 
the city of New Orleans, there is a tree which nobody looks at without 
curiosity and without wondering how it came there. For a long time 
it was the only one of its kind known in the state, and from its 
isolated position it has always been cursed with sterility. It reminds 




CHARLES GAYARRE. 



THE TREE OF TEE DEAD. 13 

one of the warm climes of Africa or Asia, and wears the aspect of a 
stranger of distinction driven from his native country. Indeed, with 
its sharp and thin foliage, sighing mournfully under the blast of one 
of our November northern winds, it looks as sorrowful as an exile. 
Its enormous trunk is nothing but an agglomeration of knots and 
bumps, which each passing year seems to have deposited there as a 
mark of age, and as a protection against the blows of time and of the 
world. Inquire for its origin, and every one will tell you that it has 
stood there from time immemorial. A sort of vague but impressive 
mystery is attached to it, and it is as superstitiously respected as one 
of the old oaks of Dodona. Bold would be the axe that should strike 
the first blow at that foreign patriarch; and if it were prostrated to 
the ground by a profane hand, what native of the city would not 
mourn over its fall, and brand the act as an unnatural and criminal 
deed '. So, long live the date-tree of Orleans Street— that time-honored 
descendant of Asiatic ancestors ! 

In the beginning of 1727, a French vessel of war landed at New 
Orleans a man of haughty mien, who wore the Turkish dress, and 
whose whole attendance was a single servant. He was received by the 
governor with the highest distinction, and was conducted by him to a 
small but comfortable house with a pretty garden, then existing at the 
corner of Orleans and Dauphine Streets/and which, from the circum- 
stance of its being so distant from other dwellings, might have been 
called a rural retreat, although situated in the limits of the city. 
There the stranger, who was understood to be a prisoner of state, lived 
in the greatest seclusion ; and although neither he nor his attendant 
could be guilty of indiscretion, because none understood their language, 
and although Governor Perier severely rebuked the slightest inquiry, 
yet it seemed to be the settled conviction in Louisiana, that the mys- 
terious stranger was a brother of the Sultan, or some great personage 
of the Ottoman Empire, who had fled from the anger of the vice- 
regent of Mohammed, and who had taken refuge in France. The Sultan 
had peremptorily demanded the fugitive, and the French government 
thinking it derogatory to its dignity to comply with that request, but 
at the same time not wishing to expose its friendly relations with the 
Moslem monarch, and perhaps desiring, for political purposes, to keep 
in hostage the important guest it had in its hands, had recourse to the 
expedient of answering that he had fled to Louisiana, which was so 
distant a country that it might be looked upon as the grave, where, as 
it was suggested, the fugitive might be suffered to wait in peace for 
actual death, without danger or offence to the Sultan. Whether this 
story be true or not is now a matter of so little consequence that it 
would not repay the trouble of a strict historical investigation. 



14 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

The year 1727 was drawing to its close, when on a dark, stormy 
night the howling and barking of the numerous dogs in the streets of 
New Orleans were observed to be fiercer than usual, and some of that 
class of individuals who pretend to know everything, declared that, by 
the vivid flashes of the lightning, they had seen, swiftly and stealthily 
gliding toward the residence of the unknown, a body of men who wore 
the scowling appearance of malefactors and ministers of blood. There 
afterward came also a report that a piratical-looking Turkish vessel 
had been hovering a few days previous in the bay of Barataria. Be it 
as it may, on the next morning the house of the stranger was deserted. 
There were no traces of mortal struggle to be seen ; but in the garden 
the earth had been dug, and there was the unmistakable indication of 
a recent grave. Soon, however, all doubts were removed by the find- 
ing of an inscription in Arabic characters, engraved on a marble tablet, 
which was subsequently sent to France. It ran thus : " The justice of 
Heaven is satisfied, and the date-tree shall grow on the traitor's tomb. 
The sublime Emperor of the faithful, the supporter of the faith, the 
omnipotent master and Sultan of the Avorld, has redeemed his vow. 
<iod is great, and Mohammed is his prophet. Allah!" Sometime 
after this event, a foreign-looking tree was seen to peep out of the spot 
where a corpse must have been deposited in that stormy night, when 
the rage of the elements yielded to the pitiless fury of man, and it 
thus explained in some degree this part of the inscription, " the date- 
tree shall grow on the traitor's grave." 

Who was he, or what had lie done, who had provoked such relent- 
less and far-seeking revenge \ Ask Nemesis, or — at that hour when 
evil spirits are allowed to roam over the earth, and magical invoca- 
tions are made — go and interrogate the tree of the dead. 



A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF ACADIA, FROM THE 
SETTLEMENT OF THE COLONY TO THE DISPER- 
SION OF THE INHABITANTS* 

BY ALCEE FOBTIER. 

[Alcee Fortier was born in St. James Parish, La.. June 5, 1856. In youth he 
studied for some time at the University of Virginia. He is, at this writing, professor 
of French in Tulane University — a position which he has held since 1879, when that insti- 
tution was still known as the University of Louisiana. Pie is the president of ''L - - 
Athenee Louisianais, " and of the American Folk-Lore Society. With great capacity for 
work, his scholarship embraces protracted studies in philology and history. Proficient in 
French and English, he has contributed to the literature of both languages. His French 
works include Le Chateau de Chambord (1884) ; Le Vieux Frangais et la Littirature du 
Moyen Age (1885); Gabriel d'Ennerich, an historical novelette (1886); Les Conquitesdes 
Normands (1889) ; Sept Grands Auteurs du XIX* SiMe (1889) ; and Eidoire de la 
Littiratv/re Frangaise (1893). His English works include Bits of Louisiana Folk-Lore 
(1888) ; annotated editions of De Vigny's Le Cachet, Rouge (1890) and of Comeille's 
Polyeucte (1891) ; and Louisiana Studies (1894).] 

Even before the time of John Cabot, the Normans, the Bretons, 
and the Basques are said to have known Newfoundland ; and the first 
description of the shores of our United States was made in 1521 to a 
French king, Francis the First, by the Florentine Yerrazano. Ten 
years later we see the bold son of St. Malo sailing on the broad St. 
Lawrence, which was to be the scene of so many conflicts for the ] >< >s- 
session of its rugged shores. In 1535 Jacques Cartier saw the future 
site of Quebec and Montreal, and became acquainted with the Indian 
tribes, the future allies of the French in their contest with the English. 
New France was discovered, but who was to establish the first settle- 
ment in the name of the Most Christian King % In vain did Jean 
Francois de la Roque, Sieur de Roberval, in 15-12, brave the terrors of 
the Isle of Demons and attempt to plant a colony in New France. 
Of his ill-fated expedition nothing remained but the name of He de la 
Demoiselle, where the stern Roberval abandoned to the demons his 
niece Marguerite to punish her for an unhallowed love. The Marquis 
de la Roche with his shipload of convicts was not more successful in 
L598 than Roberval half a century before. Cham/plain and De Monts 

* For this sketch of the history of Acadia I have taken as my chief guide Park- 
man's admirable Narratives, although I do not always share his opinions and arrive 
at the same conclusions. For a complete bibliography of the subject see Critical and 
Narrative History of America, edited by Justin Winsor. 



1G HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

were to be the fathers of Canada and Acadia. The former had been 
sent on an expedition to the new world by the Commander de Chastes, 
and on his return to France associated his fortunes with those of De 
Monts, who had just been made Lieutenant-General of Acadia. 

" The word Acadia,'' says Parkman, " is said to be derived from 
the Indian Aquoddianlce, or Aquocldie, meaning the fish called a pol- 
lock. The Bay of Passamaquoddy, ' great pollock water," derives its 
name from the same origin.* 1 

The region designated by this name comprised a large territory, 
Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Maine, but was later considered to 
embrace the peninsula of Nova Scotia only. The climate was much 
milder than that of Canada, and all travellers describe the country as 
beautiful. The tide in the Bay of Fundy is grand, and there are excel- 
lent ports along the coast. We need not then be astonished that 
Poutrincourt, one of De Monts' s companions, was so pleased with the 
Port Royal that he obtained a grant from De Monts, and in 1605 
established a colony which, after many vicissitudes, was destined to 
be celebrated in history and in romance. De Monts himself, with Pou- 
trincourt, Champlain, and Pontgrave, had in 1604 founded a settle- 
ment at St. Croix ; but the place was badly chosen, and after a winter 
of misery the colony was transferred to Port Royal. De Monts was a 
Calvinist, and he had taken with him to the new world both Catholic 
priests and Protestant ministers, who, it can well be imagined, were 
not on very good terms. Such were their quarrels that the sailors 
buried in the same grave a priest and a minister, " to see if they would 
lie peaceably together." De Monts returned to France to protect his 
fur-trade monopoly, and left Pontgrave in command at Port Royal. 
He was absent many months, and Pontgrave had abandoned the 
colony, leaving only two men in charge, when Poutrincourt arrived 
with supplies. Pontgrave returned, and another attempt was made to 
establish Port Royal on a solid foundation. The poet Lescarbot gives 
an interesting account of the winter passed, without very great suffer- 
ings, and already the colonists were beginning to hope, when in the 
summer of 1607 news was received that De Monts's charter had been 
rescinded and that the colony must be abandoned. The settlers 
departed with heavy hearts, leaving the Indians full of sorrow. The 
French had been humane and friendly to the savages. 

The settlement in Acadia had apparently failed, but Poutrincourt 
was not discouraged. He obtained from the King a confirmation of 
his grant, formed a partnership with the Sieur Robin, and in 1610 
returned to Port Royal with other settlers. Unhappily, however, the 
year 1610 was as fatal to Acadia as to France : the great King, Henry 
TV., was murdered, and soon afterward Madame la Marquise de 



A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF ACADIA. 17 

Guercheville obtained from Marie de Medicis a grant of all Acadia. 
The pious Marquise was associated with the Jesuits and wished to 
convert the Indians. Her agents and priests, especially the able and 
energetic Father Biard, did not agree with Poutrincourt and his son 
Biencourt, and discord was supreme in the colony, when in 1(513 a 
heavy blow fell on the rising settlement. Samuel Argall, already 
noted for having abducted Pocahontas, heard of French Port Royal, 
captured a part of the inhabitants and dispersed the others. Father 
Biard and Madame de Guercheville' s commander, Saussaye, finally 
reached France, and the good lady's plans for saving the souls of the 
Indians were frustrated. 

Biencourt had escaped during the destruction of Port Royal, and 
was roaming in the woods with a few followers when Poutrincourt 
arrived with supplies. At the sight of his son's misery, the Baron lost 
all hope for his colony and returned to France, where in 1615 he died 
a soldier's death. Biencourt, however, rebuilt Port Royal and kept 
the colony alive. Little progress was made, as in 1686 the whole 
population of Acadia was only nine hundred and fifteen. There had 
been troublous times in the colony from 1613 to 1686, and several 
masters had ruled the country. In 1621 Sir William Alexander 
obtained from James I. a grant of New Scotland, and tried to establish 
baronetcies in Acadia. His plans were but short-lived, as the English 
surrendered the province to the French in 1632 by the treaty of St. 
Germain. Louis XIII. appointed M. de Razilly Governor of Acadia, 
and the latter named as his lieutenants Charles de la Tour and the 
Sieur d'Aulnay. Here comes a romantic episode. The two lieutenants, 
as in duty bound, quarrelled and made war upon each other. La Tour 
went to Boston to obtain aid against his rival, and in his absence 
D'Aulnay attacked his fort. The place was most bravely defended by 
Madame de la Tour, but she was defeated and died of. mortification. 
Her husband struggled for some time with little success against 
D'Aulnay ; but the latter died, and La Tour settled all difficulties by 
marrying his rival's widow— a queer but not unwise proceeding. 

Acadia had become once more peaceful, in 1653, by La Tour's 
marriage, when one year later the English took possession of the 
colony. Cromwell was ruling England at that time, and he under- 
stood how important it was for the English settlements on the Atlan- 
tic that Acadia should not belong to the French. By his orders Major 
Robert Sedgwick, of Charlestown, and Captain John Leverett, of 
Boston, subjugated Acadia, which was kept by the English until 1668, 
when, by the treaty of Breda, it was restored to the French. 

For twervty-two years the colony enjoyed peace under French rule, 
and the inhabitants led comparatively quiet lives, enlivened by some 
2 



18 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

adventures with the Indians and the English. A very romantic char- 
acter is the Baron de St. Castin, the son-in-law of Matakando, the most 
powerful Indian chief of that region. In the company of his Indian 
relatives the bold Baron waged incessant war against the English. 

In 1690 Frontenac was for a second time governor of New France, 
and by his energy and courage he saved the colony from ruin. He 
repulsed the attacks of Phips against Quebec, and of Schuyler against 
Montreal, carried war into the English possessions, and nearly broke 
the power of the Iroquois. He was not, however, able to save Acadia 
from the enemy. This settlement was too remote from Quebec to be 
effectually protected, and fell again into the hands of the English. In 
1690 William Phips sailed from Boston with a small fleet and reduced 
the principal Acadian settlements. He obtained great booty and was 
well received on his return to Massachusetts, although his expedition 
seems to us more like a piratical raid than legitimate warfare. 

Acadia was again restored to the French in 1697 by the treaty 
of Ryswick, and when Frontenac died, in 1698, Louis XIV. was still 
master of all New France. Frontenac is a most interesting and 
heroic character ; lie was proud and stern, but at the same time most 
brave, skilful, and shrewd. His name and that of Montcalm are the 
greatest in the history of New France. 

Nearly one hundred years had passed since De Monts had landed 
in Acadia, and the unfortunate colony had been thrown about like a 
shuttlecock, from the French to the English, and from the English to 
the French. In the beginning of the eighteenth century three expe- 
ditions sailed from Boston to conquer Acadia. The first two were 
not successful ; but the third, commanded by Governor Nicholson and 
composed of thirty-six vessels, took Port Royal and subdued the 
country. The whole number of inhabitants in 1710 was twenty-hve 
hundred. Three years later, by the treaty of Utrecht, Acadia was 
formally ceded to England ; and France, in order to compensate for 
the loss of Port Royal, called by the English Annapolis, had to build 
on Cape Breton the celebrated fortress of Louisbourg. The Acadians 
had fought bravely for their independence, and it was only after a 
gallant resistance that Subercase had surrendered Port Royal. The 
English imposed their domination upon Acadia by force, and it is not 
surprising that the inhabitants refused to become Englishmen and did 
all in their power to remain faithful to their king, their religion, and 
their language. 

L'abbe Casgrain in his charming book, Vh Pelennage au Pays 
d- Evangeline, has given a beautiful description of Acadia, and calls 
attention to the poetical and expressive names of some parts of the 
country— Beaubassin, Beausejour, le Port Royal, la Grand-Pree, 



A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF ACADIA. 19 

names characteristic of the simple and peaceful disposition of a people 
who, if left to themselves, would have been satisfied with praying to 
their God and attending to their numerous children. In 1885 l'abbe 
Casgrain visited all Acadia, and manifests his delight on seeing a land 
of quiet and happiness, a land of which a great part has again become 
French. What a contrast between the Acadia of our days and that 
of 1755 ! The descendants of the exiles have prospered once more in 
the land of their ancestors, but their present state of contentment 
does not make us forget the misery of the past. The field that was 
once the scene of a bloody battle may now be covered with green turf 
and variegated flowers ; but still there will rise before us the faces of 
the dying, and we shall hear the thunder of the cannon. La Grand- 
Pree and Beaubassin may present an attractive sight, but the names 
recall to our minds the scene of a dreadful tragedy. . 

By the treaty of Utrecht it had been stipulated that the Acadians 
might withdraw to the French possessions if they chose. There is no 
doubt that the English governors did all in their power to prevent 
the emigration to Cape Breton or to Canada, and as they were not 
harsh, as a rule, to the inhabitants, the latter preferred to remain in 
the country of their ancestors. They refused, however, for a long- 
time to take the oath of allegiance to the English sovereign, and 
when a part of the men took the oath, it Avas with the tacit if not 
expressed understanding that they would never be compelled to bear 
arms against the French. That the priests in Acadia, and even the 
Governor of Canada, tried to keep the inhabitants faithful to the 
French King, in spite of their being English subjects, there is no 
reasonable doubt. We can hardly blame this feeling, if we consider 
what great rivalry there was at the time between the English and 
the French in America, and also the spirit of intolerance then every- 
where prevalent. The priests must have considered it a duty on 
their part to try to harm the English heretics, and although we may 
not approve the acts of some of them, nor the duplicity of some of 
the French agents, we do not find in their conduct any excuse for 
the cruelty of the English. 

Seeing how disaffected the Acadians were with their new masters, 
the Marquis of Cornwallis, in 1749, laid the foundations of Halifax as 
a protection against Louisbourg. A number of the inhabitants had 
escaped from the colony at the instigation of Tabbe le Loutre, says 
Parkman, and had gone to the adjoining French settlements. Their 
lot was a sad one, as the French were not able to provide for them, 
and the English would only receive them as English subjects. It is 
not astonishing that they should make a kind of guerilla war with their 
Indian allies against the English, and that they should attempt to 



20 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

excite their countrymen against the conquerors. It must be admitted 
that the English were in great peril in the midst of men openly or 
secretly hostile to them, but no necessity of war can justify the meas- 
ures taken to rid English Nova Scotia of her French Acadians. Let 
us now relate briefly the terrible event which has made the word 
Acadia sadly celebrated. 

In 1755 the Governor of Acadia was Charles Lawrence, a name 
destined to obtain an unenviable notoriety. He resolved to expel the 
French from the posts which they still held in the colony. A force 
of eighteen hundred men, commanded by Colonel Monckton, started 
from New England and captured Fort Beausejour, which the cowardly 
and vile commandant, Vergor, surrendered at the first attack. On 
the Plains of Abraham he was also to be the first to yield to Wolfe, 
and to cause the defeat and death of the brave Montcalm, the fall of 
Quebec, and the loss of Canada. 

After the capture of Beausejour, Fort Gaspereau surrendered also, 
and there was no longer any obstacle to prevent Lawrence from 
accomplishing a design which he must have been cherishing for some 
time. The Governor determined to remove from the province all the 
French Acadians. He required from the inhabitants an oath of 
unqualified allegiance, and on their refusal he resolved to proceed to 
extreme measures. Parkman says that " the Acadians, though calling 
themselves neutrals, were an enemy encamped in the heart of the 
province," and adds : " These are the reasons which explain and 
palliate a measure too harsh and indiscriminate to be wholly justified." 

It is impossible to justify the measure in any way. Fear of an 
enemy does not justify his murder ; and the expulsion of the Acadi- 
ans was the cause of untold misery, both physical and moral, anil of 
the death of a number of men, women, and children. If the harsh 
removal of the Acadians is justifiable, so is Bonaparte's massacre of 
the prisoners of Jaffa. He could not provide for them as prisoners, 
and if he released them they would immediately attack him again. 

Governor Lawrence was so much the more inexcusable, because 
the only Acadians that gave him any cause for anxiety were those 
of Beausejour, and they had been defeated. The inhabitants of the 
Basin of Mines and of Annapolis were peaceful, prosperous, and con- 
tented ; and although they might have sided with the French in an 
invasion of the province, they never would have thought of revolting 
against the English. They were an ignorant and simple people, but 
laborious, chaste, and religious. Their chief defect seems to have been 
an inordinate love for litigation, a trait which they inherited from 
their Norman ancestors. 

Lawrence took away the guns of many of the inhabitants by an 



A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF ACADIA. 21 

unworthy stratagem, and then he ordered the ruthless work to be 
done. Monckton seized the men of Beausejour ; and Winslow, Hand- 
field, and Murray did the same at la Grand-Pree, at Annapolis, and at 
Fort Edward. Let us picture the scene at la Grand-Pree. 

Winslow issued a proclamation calling upon all the men to meet 
him at the village church on Sunday. There he was at the appointed 
hour with his two hundred and ninety men, fully armed, to meet the 
intended victims. Four hundred and eighteen men answered the call 
and assembled in the church. What was their consternation on hear- 
ing that they were prisoners, that all their property was confiscated, 
and that they were to be torn from their homes with their families ! 
No resistance was possible, as the men were unarmed. They were put 
for safe keeping on board four ships, and on the 8th of October the 
men, women, and children were embarked. This was le grand derange- 
ment of which their descendants, says Tabbe Casgrain, speak to this 
day. Winslow completed his work in December and shipped twenty- 
five hundred and ten persons. Murray, Monckton, and Handheld 
were equally successful, and more than six thousand persons were 
violently expelled from the colony. A few managed to escape, 
although they were tracked like wild beasts. In order to compel 
them to surrender, the dwellings and even the churches were burnt 
and the crops were destroyed. The fugitives suffered frightfully, and 
many women and children died of misery. In this scene of persecu- 
tion we are glad to see the brave officer Boishebert defeat a party of 
English who were burning a church at Peticodiac. Unhappily, as 
already stated, no resistance could be made, and the unfortunates were 
huddled together like sheep on board the transports, to be scattered 
about all along the Atlantic coast among a hostile people, speaking 
a language unknown to them, and having a creed different from their 
own. 

Who can imagine the feelings of these men and women when the 
ships started on the fatal journey, and they threw a last glance at 
their once beautiful country, now made " desolate and bare " ! How 
many ties of kindred and of love were rudely torn asunder ! The 
families were not always on the same ship, and the father and mother 
were separated from their children, and many Evangelines never met 
their Gabriels. The order of expulsion was harsh and cruel, and it was 
executed with little regard for the most sacred feelings of the human 
heart. 

We shall not follow the Acadians in their wanderings. Let us 
only state that their lot in the English colonies was generally a hard 
one. Very few remained where they had been transported. Many 
returned to their country after incredible sufferings, to be again 



22 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

expelled in 1/7B2 ; some went to France, where they formed a settle- 
ment at Belle Isle ; some went to the Antilles, and some at last found 
a true home in hospitable Louisiana.* At the peace of 1763, a number 
of Acadians returned to Nova Scotia ; and their descendants, together 
with those of the inhabitants who had escaped from the persecution, 
number now, according to l'abbe Casgrain, more than one hundred 
and thirty thousand souls. This fecundity is wonderful, and if we 
consider the tenacity of those people, their attachment to their fami- 
lies, to their country, to their religion, we may indeed say with the 
warm-hearted Canadian abbe, " The Acadians are as astonishing for 
their virtues as for their misfortunes." 

* [ " Between the 1st of January and the 13th of May, 1765, about six hundred and 
fifty Acadians had arrived at New Orleans, and from that town had been sent to form 
settlements in Attakapas and Opelousas under the command of Andry."— Gayarre'a 
History of Louisiana (1879), Vol. II., p. 121.] 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN" LOUISIANA, AND ITS 
CONSEQUENCES. 

BY JOHN R. FICKLEN. 

[John Rose Ficklen was born in Falmouth, Va., December 14, 1858. He attended 
the University of Virginia, where, in due course, he took the degree of Bachelor of 
Letters. In 1879-80 he was assistant professor of Ancient Languages in the Louisiana 
State University, at Baton Rouge. He then resigned this position and went to Europe 
for a stay of one year and a half. lie studied Modern Languages in Paris and at the 
University of Berlin. On his return to Louisiana, in 1882, he was elected professor of 
English in the High School of the University of Louisiana. He filled the chair of 
History and Rhetoric in Tulane University for a number of years, and in 1893 was 
appointed professor of History and Political Science in the same University. He has 
recently published A History of Louisiana, written with Miss Grace Elizabeth King 
as joint author. The work has been adopted by the Louisiana State Board of Educa- 
tion for use in the public schools.] 

Rumors of the transfer to Spain reached Louisiana in the course of 
time, but they were so vague and uncertain that the colonists refused 
to believe them. In October, 1761, however, uncertainty suddenly 
changed to certainty ; for during this month a letter addressed to the 
French Governor, M. d'Abbadie, came from his Majesty Louis XV., 
announcing that the cession had been made, and that M. d'Abbadie 
must hold himself ready to deliver over to the authorized agent of 
his Catholic Majesty the whole province of Louisiana. The King 
expressed a hope, however, that the functions of the religious institu- 
tions, as well as all the laws and customs of the province, would be 
continued by the King of Spain, and that the grants of lands made 
by the French Government would be confirmed. When the contents 
of this letter were made public, the inhabitants were at first over- 
whelmed with grief ; but soon their patriotism, which had been stirred 
to its depths by the news of the proposed alienation, found expression 
in the calling of a great meeting at New Orleans from all the parishes 
to consider what measures should be taken to keep the colony under 
the government of their beloved France. 

A recent writer (George W. Cable, in his Creoles of Louisiana) has 
declared that the true motive which aroused the Creoles of Louisiana 
against the Spanish Government in 1768 was "not loyalty to France, 
but the fear of commercial and industrial annihilation." Anger 
arising from the Spanish restrictions on trade certainly played its 



24 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

part in the expulsion of Ulloa ; but in the great meeting held in New 
Orleans two years before the Spanish Governor arrived, the first and 
predominant feeling of the Creoles was their love for France. Any 
fears that existed of Spanish innovations had been allayed by that 
passage in the King of France's letter which had expressed the hope 
that his Catholic Majesty would respect the law r s, customs, and institu- 
tions of the colony. There was no feeling, therefore, but that of 
burning loyalty to France when the assembled inhabitants unani- 
mously decided to send to France an ambassador in the person of 
Jean Milhet, the richest merchant of the city, who should plead at the 
foot of the throne that France would annul the act of cession ; that 
Louis the Well-Beloved would take back a colony which was bound to 
him by a hundred ties. 

Jean Milhet, thus chosen by the voice of the people, sailed away to 
France, and those Avho had sent him awaited w r ith deep solicitude the 
result of his mission. In France, Bienville was still alive. Though 
the burden of eighty-six years and the vicissitudes of his life had 
weakened his physical powers, his mind was clear, his spirit was 
active, and his love for Louisiana was as intense as of old. Sought 
out by Milhet, Bienville with eagerness agreed to accompany the 
ambassador to the King's council chamber, and to join his own prayers 
to those of Milhet for the restoration of Louisiana to France. All 
petitions, however, must reach the King through his chief minister, 
the Due de Choiseul. By him the venerable Bienville and Milhet 
were received with great courtesy, but in this instance diplomatic and 
political matters were not to be decided by an appeal to sentiment. 
Choiseul, moreover, had himself been the King's representative in 
effecting the transfer of Louisiana to Spain, and had given to this act 
his hearty approval. Through him, therefore, there was no hope of 
success. He not only refused to carry their petition to the King, 
but, it is said, skilfully prevented them from gaining access to his 
Majesty. 

Such were the sad tidings that Milhet was compelled to send 
home, but he lingered in France with the vain hope that fortune 
might yet favor his mission through some change of policy on the 
part of the French Government. Diplomacy might win where an 
appeal to the heart had failed. 

The prolonged sojourn of Milhet in France, together with the delay 
of the Spanish court in taking possession, kept alive the hopes of the 
Louisianians. Perhaps, after all, they thought, the transfer of the 
province to Spain may be but a diplomatic move to deceive England, 
until France has recovered from the shock of war and can declare once 
more her old-time enmity to that country. 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN LOUISIANA. '25 

Months elapsed, the passage of time serving rather to lighten than 
to increase the fears of the colonists, when finally an unexpected event 
dashed all hopes to the ground. A letter came from Havana, announc- 
ing the fact that Don Antonio Ulloa, the newly appointed Spanish 
Governor, was on his way to take possession of Louisiana. The letter, 
though brief, was couched in courteous terms ; Ulloa declaring therein 
that he flattered himself in advance that his coming- would give him a 
favorable opportunity to render to the Superior Council all the services 
which this body or the colonists could desire. On the 28th of Febru- 
ary, 1766, Ulloa reached the Balize, and on the 5th of March following, 
more than four years after the famous act of cession had been passed, 
his vessel anchored before New Orleans. A great storm of rain and 
thunder announced his arrival ; and the inhabitants, while they 
received him with every mark of respect, were far from enthusiastic. 
Even in the storm they found an omen of grief and disaster. 

Ulloa was accompanied by three Spaniards of rank, who were to 
form his council. These were Juan Loyola, Commissary of War; 
Martin Navarro, Treasurer ; and Estevan de Gayarre, Royal Auditor 
and Comptroller. M. d'Abbadie having died during the preceding; 
year, the Governor of Louisiana was at this time Charles Aubry, an 
officer who had commanded the French forces at Fort Duquesne before 
it yielded to the arms of George Washington, and who had won the 
Cross of St. Louis for his distinguished services. In spite, however, of 
the military ability which he had shown in the French army, Aubry 
was far from possessing a noble, independent spirit. He is said to 
have been a small, dried-up, insignificant-looking man. His subsequent 
servility to the Spaniards, and the persistence with which he painted 
in the blackest colors the actions of the Creoles, won for him the hearty 
dislike and contempt of all the Louisianians. 

Ulloa had brought with him only ninety men. He had been led 
to expect that the French soldiers in Louisiana would pass under his 
command, but in this expectation he was disappointed. These soldiers, 
who, it seems, had already served beyond their term, now declared that 
they were entitled to their release, and that they would enter no other 
service than that of their own King. As L T lloa feared to use force, he 
found himself in an awkward predicament. His proper course would 
have been to show his credentials and appeal to the act of cession 
signed by the King of France. But Ulloa, who had distinguished 
himself in the world of letters, was totally lacking in the art of diplo- 
macy. His humor was that of a scholar rather than that of a states- 
man, and he pursued a course far different from that which would have 
been politic. . A conciliatory spirit was necessary to calm the natural 
indignation of the Louisianians thus transferred like serfs from one 



26 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

master to another. But Ulloa's petulance, his haughty manners, and 
his total lack of sympathy were the theme of- every conversation. 
After his expulsion, however, he wrote an account of his reception in 
Louisiana, which serves in some measure to explain his conduct. Some 
days after his arrival, he tells us, the merchants presented him with a 
memorial, in which they asked him to define the course he intended to 
pursue, so that they might govern themselves accordingly. In view 
of the fact that the Spaniard had not shown his credentials, the pres- 
entation of such a memorial would not seem unnatural ; but Ulloa, 
accustomed to the homage and respect he had everywhere received, 
both as an author and a representative of the Spanish Government, 
regarded the conduct of the inhabitants as "full of insolence and 
menace." His antipathy had been further increased, he tells us, by a 
letter from the former French Governor, Kerlerec, who, soured by his 
own experiences in Louisiana, now wrote from the Bastile to condole 
with Ulloa for being obliged to live in so wretched a country. 

The new Governor's first acts, moreover, seemed fated to stir up 
opposition by wounding the colony in two of its tenderest spots — 
its currency and its commerce. The colonists believed, whether 
justly or not, that the Spanish Government ought to redeem the 
depreciated currency of the colony at par. This the French Govern- 
ment had never done ; this Ulloa, also, refused to do. He, however, 
bought up at seventy-five per cent, discount as much of it as was 
offered in the market, and tendered it to his own soldiers in payment 
of their services, but even these declined to accept it. In September, 
L766, moreover, the merchants were astounded to learn that a procla- 
mation had been issued through Aubry, but emanating from the Span- 
ish Government, which placed serious restrictions upon the maritime 
commerce of the colony. In the beginning, some commercial privi- 
leges had been temporarily granted by Ulloa ; but, on the ground that 
they had been abused, these were now practically withdrawn by the 
Spanish King, and a series of vexatious restrictions was substituted. 
For instance, a maximum price for the sale of all goods was fixed by 
the Government, and merchants who refused to accept it were forced 
to sell elsewhere. Under the circumstances, this in itself was enough 
to cause a revolution among the merchants. Petitions from them 
and from the captains of vessels were immediately presented to the 
Superior Council. Before any action was taken, however, Aubry 
agreed to suspend the effect of the proclamation for a while. But 
great damage had already been done to commerce, for the fear of 
changes to be made in the near future almost paralyzed the trade 
with the French and English colonies. Even Aubry afterwards 
appealed to the Spanish Government to permit a free -exchange of 



THE REVOLUTION OF 176S IN LOUISIANA. 27 

goods between the colony and the French possessions, declaring that 
it would be one of the greatest benefits which could be conferred 
upon Louisiana. 

Ulloa himself, who had been thus far governing through the ever- 
subservient Aubrv, now left New Orleans and retired to a lonely 
station at the Balize. Here, in one of the most desolate parts of 
Louisiana, he remained for seven months. During the cold winter he 
employed his leisure in superintending the construction of a Span- 
ish fort, upon which he spent twenty-five thousand pounds sterling. 
Such eccentric behavior excited much comment in New Orleans. 
Finally Aubrv went down to visit him, and while he was there Ulloa 
proposed to him that the act of taking possession should be celebrated 
at the Balize instead of in New Orleans. After some remonstrances 
Aubry consented to this strange proceeding, and the act of transfer 
was signed bv him, with the understanding that on the following day 
the Spanish flag should be publicly displayed at the Balize. When 
the time for this ceremony arrived, however, LTlloa had changed his 
mind and requested that the public act be deferred till the arrival 
of the Spanish troops. When Aubrv returned to the city he did not 
inform the inhabitants of the secret act of transfer, but continued to 
govern the colony as before. Both he and Ulloa forwarded to their 
respective masters copies of this secret act. 

In March, 176T, a surprising piece of news reached New ( h'leans. 
Ulloa, who was then fifty-one years of age, had lingered at the Balize 
awaiting the arrival of the Marchioness of Abrado, a rich and beauti- 
ful Peruvian lady, whom he had wooed in her own country, and who 
had promised to come to Louisiana as the destined bride of the dis- 
tinguished Spaniard. When she finally arrived at the Balize she was 
quickly united to Ulloa by his private chaplain, and the couple came 
up to New Orleans to spend their honeymoon. The chief colonists 
held aloof from him, and Ulloa, exasperated by their enmity, made no 
effort to conciliate public opinion. His persistence in assuming the 
position of Governor without showing his credentials added rancor to 
the dislike with which he was regarded. Aubry was still his repre- 
sentative, and no Spanish troops arrived. At the new fort of the 
Balize, however, the Spanish flag had been hoisted ; and Ulloa, as a 
protection against the English, established new posts on the Missouri, 
on the River Iberville, and opposite Natchez. At these various sta- 
tions he distributed the ninety soldiers whom he had brought, and took 
formal possession. To these acts no opposition seems to have been 
made, though in New Orleans and at other posts on the river as far 
up as the Illinois district the French flag waved as before. 

This strange condition of things was announced to the French 



28 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

Government by Aubry in January, 1768. But during this year the 
exasperation of the inhabitants was no longer to-be restrained. " This 
province,'" Aubry wrote, "persists in its desire to remain French.'' 
" I was in hopes," he says elsewhere, " that everything would go on 
quietly till the arrival of the Spanish troops ; but, unfortunately, a 
general revolt has broken out against the Spanish Governor and his 
nation, and upset all our plans. The small amount of money sent 
hither by the Spanish Government, the debts contracted in the name 
of the King of Spain, and which have not been paid — all this, added 
to the general misery which reigns in the colony, has reduced the 
people to a condition of despair.*" 

In a previous letter Aubry had declared that his position was 
anomalous. " I command for the King of France, and at the same 
time I govern the colony as if it belonged to the King of Spain. The 
Governor constantly begs me to issue regulations touching the police 
and the commerce of the colony — regulations which are a source of 
astonishment to every one. It is not a pleasant task," he adds, " to 
o-overn a province which for three years has not known whether it is 
French or Spanish, and which, until the Spaniards take possession, 
has really no master." 

If such were the sentiments of Aubry, who was ever ready, in his 
official acts, to show a servile obedience to Spain, and who a short 
time afterwards accepted a present of three thousand dollars from the 
Spanish Government for his services, it may easily be imagined with 
what indignation the high-spirited Creoles regarded the conduct of 
Spain. If that country declined to pay the debts contracted in her 
name, if for more than two years she refused to send Ulloa sufficient 
troops to take formal possession, it must be because she believed that 
so insignificant a colony could be held without any just sense of obli- 
gation, without any show of authority. If, therefore, the colonists 
wished to escape the imputation of cowardice in the eyes of the world, 
such contemptuous treatment must be answered by an assertion of 
rights. This was the general state of feeling among the inhabitants, 
and during the year 17G8 it took shape in the formation of a con- 
spiracy to expel the Spanish Governor from Louisiana. 

John Milhet, who had at last returned from France, bringing with 
him a burden of disappointed hopes, threw himself heart and soul into 
this movement. Chief among the rest were Lafreniere, the attorney- 
general ; De Masan, former captain of infantry ; De Noyan and Bien- 
ville, his brother, who were both nephews of the celebrated founder of 
New ( Jrleans ; Marquis, formerly an officer in a Swiss regiment ; De 
Boisblanc, a councillor ; Doucet, a lawyer ; Joseph Milhet, a merchant ; 
Caresse, a merchant ; Joseph Villere, an officer on the German coast ; 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN LOUISIANA. 29 

Petit and Poupet, merchants ; and Foucault, the intendant-commissary 
of the colony. 

These conspirators met from time to time, near the limits of the 
city, at the house of a certain Madame Pradel, where they were 
secure from discovery. 

In July, 1768, it was decided that a secret mission should be sent 
to the English Governor at Pensacola, soliciting his aid in establishing 
the independence of Louisiana. In a report made afterwards to his 
own government, Ulloa tells us that the two men chosen for this 
mission were Bienville and Masan : and that the Enolish Governor, 
whose name was Elliott, after considerable reflection, sent them back 
with a refusal. He could hardly have done otherwise ; for his own 
government had signed the treaty of Paris with Spain, and could not 
with any show of justice give aid to her enemies. Moreover, there 
had already been some signs of disaffection to England among the 
American colonies ; and if Louisiana were to succeed in establishing" 
an independent government, those colonies might be quick to follow 
the evil example. Already prophets of a new order of things were 
not wanting, for had not the Due de Choiseul, in 1765, " foreseeing the 
coming fortunes of the new world, expressed his regrets for Louisiana, 
because he foresaw that the American colonies must soon become 
independent " ? (Bancroft's History of the United States.) 

Undismayed by the unfavorable response from Pensacola, the con- 
spirators determined to effect the expulsion of the Spaniards and then 
appeal once more to France. Their secret had been well kept ; but 
just before all was ready for the outbreak, it was betrayed to Ulloa by 
a Frenchman, against whom an adverse decision in regard to some 
property had been rendered by the Superior Council. When Aubry 
was informed of the movement, he sent for Lafreniere and protested 
against his conduct, and finally warned him that the chiefs of con- 
spiracies always come to tragic ends. Nothing, however, could now 
arrest the course of events. A petition, signed by six hundred of the 
most influential men in the colony, was presented to the Superior 
Council, requesting that Ulloa be required to depart from Louisiana. 
This petition was supported by the Attorney-General in a speech of 
burning eloquence. Though born of humble parents, Lafreniere had 
been educated in France, and had developed oratorical powers which 
gave him great influence among the masses. " With these powers," 
says Champigny, who knew him in Louisiana, " he combined a noble 
figure, a majestic port, an open countenance, and an elevated stature.' 1 
With burning eye and impassioned gesture, Lafreniere now addressed 
the Council, standing before that body like the famous tribune of the 
people, Rienzi. He reminded his hearers of the successful resistance 



30 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

which, three years before, the American colonies had made to the 
Stamp Act ; he reminded them of the course taken in 1526 by the 
people of Burgundy, when they refused to acknowledge the right 
of the King of France to cede their province, and declared that the 
last drop of their blood should be spilt in defence of their country. 
The Council adjourned till the following day, October 29, when 
Lafreniere addressed that body once more, summing up the charges 
against the Spanish Governor. One passage from this speech, 
though it has often been quoted, will bear repetition here : " In pro- 
portion to the extent both of commerce and population is the solidity 
of thrones ; both are fed by liberty and competition, which are the 
nursing mothers of the State, of which the spirit of monopoly is the 
tyrant and stepmother. Without liberty there are but few virtues. 
Despotism breeds pusillanimity and deepens the abyss of vices. Man 
is considered as sinning before God only because he retains his free 
will." (Quoted from Gayarre.) These words, which have as deep a 
meaning and as broad a significance in our day as they had then, pro- 
duced a profound impression — an impression which may be likened to 
the effect of Patrick Henry's famous protest pronounced three years 
before (1765) in the Virginia House of Burgesses. 

The Council, responding to Lafreniere's bold appeal, issued a decree 
declaring that Ulloa was " a usurper of illegal authority,''' and that he 
must leave the province in three days. A thousand people had assem- 
bled in the public square awaiting this decree of the Council. The 
Acadians and the Germans, armed with such weapons as they could 
procure on the spur of the moment, had marched down to the city 
under the leadership of Noyan and Villere. As soon as the news was 
known a white flag was unfurled, and the air resounded with cries of 
" Long live the King of France ! Long live Louis, the Well Beloved ! " 
The same day a committee of the Council called on Aubry and re- 
quested him to govern the province in the name of the King of France. 

Aubry, however, whose sympathies were altogether with the 
Spaniards, boldly protested against the decree of expulsion ; but the 
determination of the people nullified his protest. As the city, there- 
fore, was really in the hands of the revolutionary party, and as Aubry 
had no adequate force to make resistance, Ulloa and his wife retired 
on board a French frigate, which was made ready to sail. As to 
Ulloa's assistants, Messrs. Loyola, Navarro, and Gayarre, the Council 
had decreed that they should remain in the province as sponsors for 
the bonds they had issued, unless they produced the orders of the 
Spanish King. The retention of these officials to secure the payment 
of Spanish debts was regarded by Spain as no lesser insult than the 
expulsion of Ulloa. 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN LOUISIANA. 31 

While Ulloa' s frigate was still anchored in the river it happened 
that there was a wedding in New Orleans. Some young men, flushed 
with wine, were returning from the festivities at a late hour of the 
night. Acting under the impulse of the moment, they cut the cables 
of the frigate and allowed it to float down the river. It was finally 
stopped by those on board, but the following day the Spanish Gov- 
ernor, taking the hint, sailed away to Havana. Some hot-headed 
patriots, acting under the orders of Marquis, prepared to follow him 
down the river and seize the fort at the Balize; but after they had 
embarked, Aubry, who had a small body of troops, threatened to open 
fire upon them if they persisted in their intention. " For the first 
time since the beginning of the revolt, 1 ' says Aubry in his report to 
the Ministry, " I was obeyed ; and Ulloa departed under the escort of 
an officer and a detachment sent by myself to accompany him to the 
sea." 

When he reached Havana, Ulloa found a body of troops and a large 
sum of money, which, after years of vacillating policy, the King of 
Spain was finally sending to Louisiana. If they had been sent sooner, 
one sad chapter in the history of the colony might perhaps have never 
been written. Instead of returning to New ( Weans, however, Ulloa 
lingered for awhile at Havana, and then sailed for Spain. 

Thus the colony was rid for the time being of Spanish government. 
The revolution had been accomplished with the consent and coopera- 
tion of the Superior Council ; it had been accomplished without shed- 
ding one drop of blood, but its dire consequences will never be forgotten 
in Louisiana. 

When the decree of expulsion was issued against Ulloa, it was 
decided by the Superior Council that deputies should be sent to the 
French King to solicit his protection. Though Milhet had failed to 
win a hearing, another mission, it was thought, would surely succeed, 
now that the colony had shown its determination to reject the Spanish 
domination. The men chosen for this important mission were Charles 
le Sassier on the part of the Council, and St. Lette oh the part of the 
inhabitants. When Ulloa departed, however, Aubry had delivered to 
him a document which was to be shown to the Spanish court and then 
f< >r warded to the French minister. In this document Aubry attempted 
to justify his own course, and at the same time heaped charges on the 
heads of the revolutionary party. Not content with this, he sent over 
to France as his representative M. Lapeyriere, who was commissioned 
to give a full account of the revolution and to counteract any influence 
that might be exercised by the other deputies. Aubry even warned 
the French minister that these deputies would tell a different story and 
were not to be believed. 



32 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

On the 8th of November a formal investigation was held touching 
the conduct of Ulloa while in Louisiana. "Witnesses were examined 
and elaborate testimony was taken. In the full record of the proceed- 
ings, which has come down to us, there is a long and curious array of 
charges. Some convict Ulloa merely of petty tyranny in violating the 
customs of the colony. One of the witnesses, for example, was the 
famous vicar-general Pere Dagobert, whose career in Louisiana has 
been celebrated in exquisite verse by one * of our Southern poets. The 
good father s deposition against LTlloa was simply to the effect that 
the Spanish Governor had caused to be solemnized in his own house a 
marriage ceremony, for which no banns had been published, and which 
was performed by a private chaplain without consent of the vicar- 
general. " Moreover," added Dagobert, " I have been informed that 
the contracting parties were a white man and a negress ! Further- 
more, M. Ulloa, by his own secret marriage to a Spanish lady at the 
Balize, and by his bringing her in triumph to the city, gave rise to a 
great deal of scandal ; for the said marriage was marked by a total 
disregard of the forms prescribed by the civil and canonical authori- 
ties/- 

The testimony of other witnesses, however, was far more serious, 
for it showed that Ulloa had arrogated to himself the right to govern 
the province in an arbitrary manner, while refusing to exhibit any 
titles or powers from the King his master. 

Long memorials justifying the revolution were now drawn up and 
intrusted to Le Sassier and St. Lette, who were to bear to the foot of 
the French throne the most humble protestations of love and devo- 
tion on the part of the Superior Council and the inhabitants. 

The revolutionists had now nothing to do but to await the result 
of this second mission. It seems strange that any hope of success 
could have lingered in their hearts. They must have known that the 
infamous King of France was, absorbed in his dissolute pleasures and 
cared nothing for the fate of Louisiana. Moreover, they saw them- 
selves confronted with the open hostility of Aubry, which was enough 
in itself to render fruitless any mission to the French court. Foucault, 
also, who had acted with them in the beginning, now began to write 
hypocritical letters to France, justifying his own course and accusing 
his former friends of being selfish traitors who sought their own 
aggrandizement. 

When the deputies, after a long voyage, arrived in Paris, they 
found that the aged Bienville was dead and that the King's minister 
was still the inexorable Choiseul. Neither Choiseul nor his master could 

* [Mrs. Mollie E. M. Davis. Vide p. 393.] 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN LOUISIANA. 33 

be moved by the prayers of the far-away colonists ; their hearts were 
steeled against all such petitions. " It is too late now to change the 
policy of the French court," was the only answer that the deputies 
could obtain. St. Lette, who had been a school friend of the minister, 
was offered a lucrative position and remained in France ; while Le 
Sassier, alone and sad at heart, carried back to Louisiana the tidings 
of failure. The only result of the mission was an unfortunate one for 
Louisiana. The memorial from the merchants, of which St. Lette had 
been the bearer, was published in some of the foreign gazettes, and 
though it excited the deep sympathy of many who read it, its adverse 
criticisms of the Spanish Government aroused the indignation and 
gained the bitter enmity of the Spanish King and his court. 

While the revolutionary leaders were awaiting the news from 
France they found it difficult to keep up the enthusiasm of the mass 
of the people. Many of these were asking themselves what would be 
the consequences of this uprising against the authoritv of the Spanish 
nation. If that nation, famous for its pride and cruelty, should deter- 
mine to send an army to punish this rebellion, would not the meagre 
resources of the colony and its insignificant bodv of troops be power- 
less to resist? Would not the annihilation of * the colony follow as 
an inevitable result ? That many should ask themselves this ques- 
tion was but natural. A recent writer, however (Cable, in his 
Creoles of Louisiana), taking the revolution of 1768 as a text has 
thought proper to declare that "it was the fate of the Creoles— pos- 
sibly a climatic result— to be slack-handed and dilatory." "Month 
after month," he adds, "followed that October uprising without one 
of those incidents that would have succeeded in the history of an 
earnest people. Not a fort was taken, though it is probable not one 
would have withstood assault. The Creoles had not made that study 
of reciprocal justice and natural rights which becomes men who would 
resist tyranny." 

All this criticism seems to the present writer both unkind and un- 
just. The original intention of the Creoles in the expulsion of Ulloa 
was simply to rid themselves of the hated Spanish Government, and 
then return to that which was stiU very dear to them— the milder rule 
of France. When the Spaniard had departed, they sent ambassadors 
to France for the purpose of carrying out this second object. It was ' 
only natural that they should await the result of this embassy, and in 
those days of slow travel the result was not known for several months. 
True, it would have been easy for them to seize the Spanish forts, but 
a victory over the small garrisons stationed in them would have been 
a barren victory ; it would not have assisted their cause at the court 
of J ranee, and if they had at that time intended to establish a repub- 



34 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

lie, it would not in any way have furthered that object. They con- 
tented themselves, therefore, with issuing a decree that the Spanish 
frigate which Ulloa had left behind him, and which had been laid up 
for repairs, should depart from the province. They were neither 
" slack-handed " nor " dilatory " in accomplishing the main objects 
they had in view.* 

When, moreover, Le Sassier brought back the news that France had 
deserted them and practically delivered them over to the vengeance of 
Spain, then some of the boldest spirits revived the plan of establishing 
a republic — this time without the assistance of England. Marquis, 
who was a Swiss, and hence had lived under a republic, was afterward 
accused by the Spaniards of originating this plan ; but he denied it, 
though he admitted that he had seen a document drawn up for the 
formation of a new government in Louisiana. The author may very 
well have been Lafreniere ; for we know from Aubry's report that he 
favored the scheme and presented a petition to the Council requesting 
that a bank like the one in Amsterdam and Venice should be established 
in the colony. But after the Creoles had discussed among themselves 
the possibility of carrying such a scheme of government to a success- 
ful issue, they wisely came to the conclusion that for the time being it 
was absolutely Utopian. They renounced it not because they had failed 
to make " that study of reciprocal justice and natural rights which 
becomes men who would resist tyrjanny," but because they clearly saw 
that, even if England and France remained neutral, Spain would 
condemn and crush a republic, the establishment of which would be 
a dangerous example of successful revolt against monarchical gov- 
ernment. It is unreasonable to maintain that because the American 
colonies some years later were successful in their struggle against Eng- 
land, and even received the overt assistance of Louis XVI., Louisiana 
might at this period have succeeded in winning her independence. It 
is unjust, therefore, to maintain that, " had the Creoles made a study of 
reciprocal justice and natural rights, had they not lacked steadiness 
of purpose, the insurrection of 1768 might have been a revolution for 
the overthrow of French and Spanish misrule, and the establishment 
and maintenance of the right of self-government " (Cable). In fact, 
this assertion becomes simply preposterous when we remember that 
at this time the whole population scattered through Louisiana was, if 
we exclude the slaves, only six thousand souls. What could such a 
population, unaided, accomplish against the forces of one of the most 
powerf ul kings in Europe ? 

It was impossible, therefore, to do otherwise than renounce this 

* In their campaigns under Galvez and in their defence of New Orleans under Jack- 
son the Creoles showed that they were neither a " slack -handed " nor a " dilatory " race. 



THE REVOLUTION OF 17GS IN LOUISIANA. 35 

dream of establishing a free government, but it will ever be a matter 
of pride to the Louisianians that this bold scheme was nurtured in the 
brains of the patriotic Creoles of 1769, seven years before Jefferson 
gave to the world the Declaration of Independence. 

When the news of the expulsion of Ulloa was announced in Spain, 
that country was quickly aroused from the state of indifference into 
Avhich she had fallen with reference to Louisiana. A council of wise 
men was straightway called to deliberate upon the fate of the province, 
and with only one dissenting voice it was decided that Louisiana should 
be kept as a check upon the advance of the English into Mexico. 
Measures were taken accordinelv. 

T 1 • 

In the meantime the colony remained a prev to uncertainty and 
internal commotion. On the 24th of July, 1769, however, the inhabi- 
tants were thrown into a state of intense excitement by the an- 
nouncement that a new Spanish Governor, Don Alexandra O'Reillv, 
with a fleet and a force of several thousand men, had arrived at the 
Balize. 

In the hearts of some there were thoughts of resistance. Marquis 
himself donned a white cockade and summoned all those who were 
opposed to the Spanish domination to rally around him. Only a hun- 
dred men answered his summons. Many who formerly had been willing 
to follow him now felt that resistance to O'Reilly's forces could bring to 
the colony nothing but ruin and disaster. Aubry, moreover, took all 
possible measures to calm the inhabitants and engage them to submit 
to Spanish authority. 

On the 25th, at midnight, a distinguished Spaniard, Francisco 
Bouligny, arrived in New Orleans. He had come as the official repre- 
sentative of O'Reilly. Aubry entertained him with every mark of 
respect, and ordered preparations to be made for the reception of the 
new Governor. 

Lafreniere now called upon Aubry, and said that if Aubry would 
give him a letter to O'Reilly, he, accompanied by Jean Milhet and 
Pierre Marquis, would go down to meet the Governor at the Balize 
and render to him the homage of the inhabitants. By this action he 
hoped to win the clemency of the Spanish authorities and save the 
colony from a hostile invasion. As this step met with the approval 
of Aubry, the deputies set off for the Balize. Here they were received 
by O'Reilly with great courtesy, and invited to dine on board his 
ship. His conduct was such as to allay apprehensions, though in 
response to a speech from Lafreniere he declared that as yet he knew 
neither the province nor its people. " After informing myself of 
recent events," he added, " I shall be glad to perform all the kind 



36 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

offices I can, and I will avoid all acts militating- against the peace of 
the province, except such as may be justifiable and necessary." 

The return of the envoys served to calm the excitement of the 
populace, and when, on the 18th of August, O'Reilly with his forces 
disembarked at New Orleans, the act of taking possession, as 
Aubry declares, was celebrated " with all the brilliancy, pomp, and 
grandeur that befitted the monarch of whom he was the represen- 
tative." 

The scene in the old Place d' Amies was calculated to impress every 
beholder. All the French troops and the militia having been drawn 
up in the square, Aubry placed himself at their head and advanced 
to meet O'Reilly as he descended in full uniform from his vessel. 
Bridges were then thrown from the other vessels to the levee, and 
three thousand soldiers, in regular columns, marched down to the 
square. When the two Governors met, O'Reilly announced his name 
and rank. He then requested Aubry to read to the assembled people 
the orders of his Most Catholic Majesty, as well as those of the King 
of France. This was accordingly done, and Aubry, addressing the 
inhabitants, spoke as follows : 

" You have just heard the sacred orders of their Majesties the 
Kings of France and Spain, in regard to the province of Louisiana, 
which is irrevocably ceded to the Spanish Crown. From this moment 
you are subjects of his Most Catholic Majesty, and in virtue of the 
orders of the King, my master, I release you from the oath of fidelity 
and obedience which bound you to the King of France." 

Then, amid the sharp reports of musketry, the Spaniards shouted, 
" Long live the King of Spain ! " Avhile the heavy guns of the ships 
pealed forth their salutes. After the keys of the city had been deliv- 
ered to O'Reilly, the two Governors and their officers turned from the 
parade ground, and, entering the church, listened to a solemn " Te 
Deum," chanted in honor of these important events. A review of the 
Spanish veterans brought by O'Reilly completed this impressive cere- 
mony and announced the close of the French domination in Louisiana. 

The colonists, knowing that resistance was useless, and only hoping 
that the past would be forgotten, acquiesced in the new order of 
things without a murmur. 

Aubry also may have expected that past events would be forgotten ; 
but on the day following the ceremony O'Reilly addressed him a let- 
ter, in which he asked for a full account of the late rebellion, with the 
names of the leaders, and especially of the authors of the libellous 
memoir that had been issued by the inhabitants. One would suppose 
that Aubrv would have answered, that, as Ulloa had never taken for- 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN LOUISIANA. 37 

mal possession of the province, only the King of France could rightly 
demand such information. On the arrival of O'Keilly he himself had, 
for the first time, released the inhabitants from their oath of allegiance 
to the King of France; how, then, could he accuse them, before a 
Spanish Governor, of being rebels and traitors ? 

Nevertheless he immediately made a report to O'Eeilly, in which 
he gave full particulars of the events that led to and followed Ulloa's 
expulsion. Far from extenuating the faults of the revolutionary 
party, he painted the whole affair in the darkest colors, declaring, 
among other things, that the memoir of the inhabitants had originally 
contained terrible " blasphemies " directed against the Spanish nation, 
and that these had been omitted only at his earnest solicitation. " I 
cannot tell your eminence;' he continues, " to what point the feeling 
of indignation and rage against the Spanish government and nation 
was carried." Not only did he name the chief revolutionists, whom 
he described as the richest and most distinguished men in the colony, 
but he also declared that, after the expulsion of Ulloa, they were 
engaged in the most audacious and rebellious acts to stir up the people 
and fill them with horror of the Spaniards. Not a word did he add 
to excuse the rashness of those hot-headed Creoles ; not a word did he 
add with respect to the conduct of Ulloa, which had precipitated the 
revolution. 

The attitude that Aubry assumed, while it won him the gratitude 
of the Spaniards, sealed the doom of the chief conspirators. It could 
hardly be expected that O'Eeilly, a soldier accustomed to the stern 
discipline of the Spanish army, would show any mercy to men who 
were regarded as iniquitous traitors by their own Governor. 

The subsequent events must be briefly related. On the following 
day O'Eeilly decoyed to his house under various pretexts the greater 
number of those whom he wished to arrest. Though he had already 
commanded some of his troops to assemble around the house, he 
received his visitors courteously and disarmed their suspicions. Pres- 
ently, however, they were invited into an adjoining room, where, in 
the presence of Aubry, their swords Avere demanded. Addressing 
them, O'Eeilly said : " The Spanish nation is venerated and respected 
throughout the world. Louisiana is the only country which is lacking 
in the proper sentiments towards that nation. The king of Spain has 
been offended by the writings that have emanated from the colony and 
by the insult offered to Ulloa. I have been commanded by his Catho- 
lic Majesty to arrest and judge according to the laws the authors of 
the rebellion. All your goods," he concluded, " will be confiscated, 
but you yourselves will be treated with proper consideration, and 
needful succor will be afforded to your wives and children." 



38 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

The full list of those arrested by O'Reilly's, orders is given in 
Aubry's report, as follows : 

De Lafreniere, attorney -general ; De Masan, a retired captain of 
cavalry ; De Noyan, a retired captain of cavalry ; Marquis, formerly 
captain in a Swiss regiment ; De Boisblanc, a councillor ; Doucet, a 
lawyer ; Joseph and Jean Milhet, merchants ; Caresse, a merchant ; 
Villere, a militia officer ; Petit and Poupet, both merchants ; and 
Foucault, the French King's commissary. 

When O'Reilly reached New Orleans, Villere was absent on his 
plantation. lie had thought of retiring from the colony and seeking 
refuge among the English ; but he was persuaded, it is said, by a letter 
from Aubry, to repair to the city. Here he was immediately arrested 
and placed aboard a frigate as a prisoner. There are several accounts 
of his fate, all of which differ in some particulars. The most probable 
account declares that while he was being put in confinement he deter- 
mined to escape, and crying, " Villere was not born to die on a scaf- 
fold,"' he attempted to break through his guards. One of these ran a 
bayonet through his thigh. Overcome with rage and despair, Villere 
fell upon the deck, and a few days afterwards expired. 

Foucault, who, as we have seen, had played throughout the revolu- 
tion the part of an adroit scoundrel, now refused to admit O'Reilly's 
jurisdiction, and demanded to be sent to France for trial. He had 
won the contempt alike of the Creoles and the Spaniards, and O'Reilly 
allowed him to depart. It is some consolation to know that when he 
reached France the King immediately cast, him into the Bastile. 
According to Champigny, it was hinted to Noyan that, if he chose to 
make the attempt, his escape would be winked at by the Spanish 
authorities ; but he had the courageous spirit of his uncle Bienville, 
and refused to desert his comrades. As he was young and had 
recently married the daughter of Lafreniere, great sympathy was 
expressed for his untimely fate. Special indulgence was shown to his 
brother Bienville ; for, though he was among those against whom 
Aubry had preferred charges, he was never arrested. 

As the men imprisoned by O'Reilly were the most prominent and 
most beloved in the colony, the grief of the Creoles knew no bounds. 
Sympathy with O'Reilly's victims, moreover, was mingled with fears 
for their own safety. To allay these fears, O'Reilly now informed 
Aubry that he expected all the inhabitants to take the oath of alle- 
giance to the Spanish King. If any, however, wished to retire from the 
colony, and thus avoid the oath, they were free to do so. 

On the day appointed, the colonists, seemingly reconciled to their 
fate, came forward and took the oath. Even representatives from the 
German and Acadian coasts hurried down the river in obedience to 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1768 IN LOUISIANA. 39 

O'Reilly's order, and swore to obey his Catholic Majesty. The 
Acadians, at least, remembered the fatal consequences of their failure 
to accept the oath offered them in their native country by the English 
Government. 

To demand this oath of allegiance was a practical admission on 
O'Keilly's part that up to this time all the inhabitants had been sub- 
jects of the King of France. Hence this act seemed to augur well for 
the fate of the imprisoned revolutionists. But the whole course of 
events had already been mapped out by the new Governor. The day 
for the great trial was soon fixed. It was to be conducted before a 
number of Spanish officers, with O'Eeilly as president. In accord- 
ance with legal usages in cases of high treason, the accused were not 
allowed lawyers to plead in their defence. One exception, however, 
was made : it was permitted that Yillere, who was dead, should have 
an attorney to defend his memory. 

On the 20th of October, 1769, Don Felix del Key, a distinguished 
advocate, practising in the courts of San Domingo and Mexico, and 
now appointed the King's attorney-general to conduct this trial, pre- 
sented to the judges an exhaustive exposition of the case against the 
prisoners. In the archives of the Louisiana Historical Society the 
French translation of Del Key's argument covers sixty-four pages < >f 
manuscript. In it he shows what part each of the prisoners had 
taken in the rebellion, and maintains that while Ulloa had never shown 
to the Council his titles of authority, nevertheless all departments of 
the colon}?- — the ecclesiastical, the military, and the political — had 
tacitly accepted him as Governor, as was proved by the fact that all 
the expenses of the colony had been paid by the Spanish commissary 
department. This was an acknowledgment, he declares, of Ulloa's 
authority, and all-sufficient to convict the prisoners of treason toward 
the Spanish Government. If they wished to deny Ulloa's authority 
they should have done so in the beginning. In truth, their very 
presence in the colony after France had transferred it to Spain 
stamped them as subjects of his Catholic Majesty. 

It was vain for the prisoners to plead that Ulloa's authority had 
been exercised wholly through Aubry, who was the titular Governor 
in the service of the King of France ; it was vain for them to deny 
the jurisdiction of the Spanish judges and to demand a trial conducted 
in French courts according to French laws. All pleas were overruled, 
and the judges, convinced by Del Rey's argument of the guilt of the 
accused, pronounced sentence through O'Reilly as president of the 
court. It was as follows : Lafreniere, Noyan, Caresse, Marquis, and 
Joseph Milhet, as chiefs of the rebellion, were to be led to the gallows, 
with ropes around their necks and mounted on asses ; there to be 



40 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

hanged. As Joseph Villere, who was dead, had- been proved to be 
" one of the most persistent of the said conspirators," his memory was 
declared infamous for all time. The remaining prisoners were con- 
demned to various terms of confinement in the castle of De Moro, in 
Cuba. 

Every effort was made to stir the pity of O'Reilly in behalf of the 
condemned, but even before the grief and prayers of their relatives 
he remained inexorable. He was a stern soldier, who doubtless 
thought he had shown sufficient mercy in not condemning all the 
prisoners to death. One change in his plans he did make, but this 
was forced upon him. As he was informed that there was no hang- 
man in the colony, he ordered that the prisoners should be shot — 
" passes par les armes," as we are told in the old French document. 

Accordingly, on the day appointed, the five prisoners, their arms 
securely bound, were conducted to a small square near the quarters 
of the Lisbon regiment (perhaps where the lower portion of the 
French market now stands). Here a great number of troops had 
been assembled, and here the sentence of death was read aloud. 
Refusing to have their eyes bandaged, the noble five faced death like 
true patriots. One broad sheet of fire from the guns of the Spanish 
grenadiers, and all was still. The last act of the tragedy had been 
played. 

Upon whom must the responsibility fall for this judicial murder, 
which casts a dark stain across the annals of Louisiana % It seems to 
be clearly proved, by the documents that have come down to us, that 
O'Reilly acted under the orders of his King, for in the report of his 
proceedings made to the King of Spain by the Council of the Indies 
his conduct is eulogized, and these words occur : " The inhabitants 
of Louisiana rose in rebellion ; for which reason your Majesty com- 
missioned Don Alexandra O'Reilly to proceed thither, take formal 
possession, chastise the ringleaders, and establish a suitable form of 
government." The Spanish King intended to punish severely what 
in those days was regarded as the greatest of crimes — treason. As 
to Aubry, his conduct, it is true, gained for him the favor of the 
French court, and when some months later he lost his life in a 
storm, his family received a pension. In Louisiana, however, he had 
branded himself in the eyes of the Creoles as a mean-spirited informer. 
It is upon his disgraceful servility to the Spaniards, therefore, that a 
share of the responsibility must rest ; while the greater portion must 
still fall upon the weak acquiescence of the French court, which 
refused to interfere for the protection of a band of patriots whose 
only fault was their too great devotion to their King and his 
government. 



THE SOUTH'S FIRST CROP OF SUGAR. 

[From Harper's Magazine. Copyright, 1887, by Harper and Brothers.] 
BY CHARLES GAYARRE. 

Indigo had been the principal staple of the colony, but at last a 
worm which attacked the plant and destroyed it, through consecutive 
years, was reducing to poverty and to the utmost despair the whole 
population. Jean Etienne de Bore determined to make a bold' experi- 
ment to save himself and his fellow-citizens, and convert his indigo 
plantation into one of sugar-cane. 

in these critical circumstances he resolved to renew the attempt 
which had been made to manufacture sugar. He immediately pre- 
pared to go into all the expenses and incur all the obligations conse- 
quent on so costly an undertaking. His wife warned him that her 
father had in former years vainly made a similar attempt ; she repre- 
sented that he was hazarding on the cast of a die all that remained of 
their means of existence ; that if he failed, as was so probable, he 
would reduce his family to hopeless poverty ; that he was of an age — 
being over fifty years old — when fate was not to be tempted by doubt- 
ful experiments, as he could not reasonably entertain the hope of a 
sufficiently long life to rebuild his fortune if once completely shat- 
tered ; and that he would not only expose himself to ruin, but also to 
a risk much more to be dreaded — that of falling into the grasp of 
creditors. Friends and relatives joined their remonstrances to hers, 
but could not shake the strong resolve of his energetic mind. He had 
fully matured his plan, and was determined to sink or swim with it. 

Purchasing a quantity of canes from two individuals named Men- 
dez and Solis, who cultivated them only for sale as a dainty in the 
Xew Orleans market, and to make coarse syrup, he began to plant in 
1704, and to make all the other necessary preparation, and in 17!>5 
he made a crop of sugar which sold for twelve thousand dollars — a 
large sum at that time. Bore's attempt had excited the keenest inter- 
est ; many had frequently visited him during the year to witness his 
I (reparations ; gloomy predictions had been set afloat, and on the day 
when the grinding of the cane was to begin, a large number of the 
most respectable inhabitants had gathered in and about the sugar- 
house to be present at the failure or success of the experiment. Would 



42 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

the syrup granulate ? would it be converted into sugar I The crowd 
waited with eager impatience for the moment when the man who 
watches the coction of the juice of the cane determines whether it 
is ready to granulate. When that moment arrived the stillness of 
death came among them, each one holding his breath, and feeling that 
it was a matter of ruin or prosperity for them all. Suddenly the 
sugar-maker cried out with exultation, " It granulates ! " Inside and 
outside of the building one could have heard the wonderful tidings fly- 
ing from mouth to mouth and dying in the distance, as if a hundred 
glad echoes were telling it to one another. Each one of the bystanders 
pressed forward to ascertain the fact on the evidence of his own senses, 
and when it could no longer be doubted, there came a shout of joy, 
and all flocked around Etienne cle Bore, overwhelming him with con- 
gratulations, and almost hugging the man whom they called their 
savior — the savior of Louisiana, Ninety years have elapsed since, and 
an event which produced so much excitement at the time is very nearly 
obliterated from the memory of the present generation. 



THE BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 

[From The Creoles of Louisiana. Copyright, 1884, by Charles Scribner's Sons.] 

BY GEORGE W. CABLE. 

[George Washington Cable was born in New Orleans, October 12, 1844. During 
the Civil War he served in the Confederate Army in the Fourth Mississippi Cavalry. 
His early literary effusions appeared in the Neio Orleans Picayune over the pen-name of 
'"Drop Shot." His first stories of "supposed" Creole life were published in Scrib- 
ner's Monthly, and were so well received by Northern critics that he determined to fol- 
low the profession of letters. In his political writings he has proposed certain reforms 
in the convict labor system of the Southern States, and devised plans for ameliorating 
the condition of the negro. In 1879 he removed to New England, where he has since 
resided. His works include Old Creole Days (1879-8:3) ; The Orandissimes (1880) ; 
Madame Delphine (1881) ; Dr. Sevier (1888) ; The Creoles of Louisiana (1884) ; The 
Silent South (1885) ; Bonaventure (1888) ; Strange True Stories of Louisiana (1889) ; 
The Negro Question (1890) ; and Life of William Oilmore Simms (1890). One of his 
critics says : " Mr. Cable has a marvellously acute ear, a sympathetic heart, an eye far 
from myopic, an imagination warm and plastic, and much constructive skill ; hence he 
might have conveyed his impressions of Creole life without coming so perilously near to 
caricaturing it. The more's the pity ! His feeling for African slaves, octoroons, quad- 
roons, ran away with him, and led him into by-ways difficult in the extreme for a 
foreigner to traverse. For Mr. Cable — eminent Creoles claim — never really knew any- 
thing about Creole life from the inside. . . . Thus, they say, Mr. Cable goes all 
astray about the voudous and the use of the charms and amulets, and about Creole 
customs, manners, music, and cookery. The English, too, into which he translates this 
French life is often imperfect and ungrammatical, full as it is of blood, of pulse, of thrill 
and throb and word-picture."] 

Once more the Creoles sang the " Marseillaise." The invaders 
hovering along the marshy shores of Lake Borgne were fourteen 
thousand strong. Sir Edward Packenham,* brother-in-law to the 
Duke of Wellington, and a gallant captain, was destined to lead them. 
Gibbs, Lambert, and Kean were his generals of division. As to 
Jackson, thirty-seven hundred Tennesseeans under Generals Coffee and 
Carroll, had, when it was near Christmas, given him a total of but six 
thousand men. Yet confidence, animation, concord, and even gayety 
filled the hearts of the mercurial people. 

" The citizens," says the eye-witness, Latour, " were preparing for 
battle as cheerfully as for a party of pleasure. The streets resounded 
with ' Yankee Doodle, 1 ' La Marseillaise,' ' Le Chant du Depart,' and 
other martial airs. The fair sex presented themselves at the windows 

* [Spelled Pakenham by some historians.] 



44 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

and balconies to applaud the troops going through their evolutions, 
and to encourage their husbands, sons, fathers, and brothers to protect 
them from their enemies. 

That enemy, reconnoitring on Lake Borgne, soon found in the 
marshes of its extreme western end the mouth of a navigable stream, 
the Bayou Bien venue. This water flowed into the lake directly from 
the west — the direction of New Orleans, close behind whose lower 
suburb it had its beginning in a dense cypress swamp. Within its 
mouth it was over a hundred yards wide, and more than six feet deep. 
As they ascended its waters, everywhere, as far as the eye could reach, 
stretched only the unbroken quaking prairie. But soon they found 
and bribed a village of Spanish and Italian fishermen, and under their 
guidance explored the whole region. By turning into a smaller bayou, 
a branch of the first, the Mississippi was found a very few miles away 
on the left, hidden from view by a narrow belt of swamp, and hurry- 
ing southeastward toward the Gulf. From the plantations of sugar- 
cane on its border, various draining canals ran back northward to the 
bayou, offering on their margins a fair though narrow walking way 
through the wooded and vine-tangled morass to the open plains on the 
river shore, just below New Orleans. By some oversight, which has 
never been explained, this easy route to the city's very outskirts had 
been left unobstructed. On the 21st of December some Creole scouts 
posted a picket at the fishermen's village. 

The traveller on the New Orleans and Mobile Railroad, as he enters 
the southeastern extreme of Louisiana, gliding along the low, wet 
prairie margin of the Gulf, passes across an island made by the two 
mouths of Pearl River. It rises just high enough above the surround- 
ing marsh to be at times tolerably dry ground. A sportsmen's station 
on it is called English Look-out ; but the island itself seems to have 
quite lost its name. It was known then as Isle aux Poix (Pea Island). 
Here on December the 21st, 1814, the British had been for days dis- 
embarking. Early on the 22d General Kean's division reembarked 
from this island in barges, shortly before dawn of the 23d captured 
the picket at the fishers' village, pushed on up the bayou, turned to 
the left, southwestward, into the smaller bayou (Mazant), entered the 
swamp, disembarked once more at the mouth of a plantation canal, 
marched southward along its edge through the wood, and a little before 
noon emerged upon the open plain of the river shore, scarcely seven 
miles from New Orleans, without a foot of fortification between them 
and the city. But the captured pickets had reported Jackson's forces 
eighteen thousand strong, and the British halted, greatly fatigued, 
until they should be joined by other divisions. 

Not, however, to rest. At about two o'clock in the afternoon, 



THE BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 45 

while the people of the city were sitting at their midday dinner, sud- 
denly the cathedral bell startled them with its notes of alarm, drums 
sounded the long-roll, and as military equipments were hurriedly put 
on, and Creoles, Americans, and San Domingans, swords and muskets 
in hand, poured in upon the Place d'Armes from every direction and 
sought their places in the ranks, word passed from mouth to mouth 
that there had been a blunder, and that the enemy was but seven 
miles away in force — " w V ^habitation VUlere ! " (" on Villere's plan- 
tation ! ") But courage was in every heart. Quickly the lines were 
formed, the standards were unfurled, the huzza resounded as the well- 
known white horse of Jackson came galloping down their front with 
his staff — Edward Livingston and Abner Duncan among them— at his 
heels, the drums sounded quickstep, and the columns moved down 
through the streets and out of the anxious town to meet the foe. In 
half an hour after the note of alarm the Seventh regulars, with two 
pieces of artillery and some marines, had taken an advanced position. 
An hour and a half later General Coffee, with his Tennessee and Mis- 
sissippi cavalry, took their place along the small Rodriguez Canal, that 
ran from the river's levee to and into the swamp, and which afterward 
became Jackson's permanent line of defence. Just as the sun was 
setting, the troops that had been stationed at Bayou St. John, a battal- 
ion of free colored men, then the Forty-fourth regulars, and then the 
brightly uniformed Creole battalion, first came into town by way of 
the old Bayou Road, and swept through the streets toward the enemy 
on the run, glittering with accoutrements and arms, under the thronged 
balconies and amid the tears and plaudits of Creole mothers and 
daughters. 

Night came on, very dark. The Carolina dropped noiselessly down 
opposite the British camp, anchored close in shore, and opened her 
broadsides and musketry at short range. A moment later Jackson 
fell upon the startled foe with twelve hundred men and two pieces of 
artillery, striking them first near the river shore, and presently along 
their whole line. Coffee, with six hundred men, unseen in the dark- 
ness, issued from the woods on the north, and attacked the British 
right, just as it was trying to turn Jackson's left — Creole troops, whose 
ardor would have led them to charge with the bayonet, but- for the 
prudence of the Regular officer in command. A fog rose, the smoke 
of battle rested on the field, the darkness thickened, and all was 
soon in confusion. Companies and battalions — red coats, blue coats, 
Highland plaidies, and "dirty shirts" (Tennesseeans), from time 
to time got lost, fired into friendly lines, or met their foes in hand- 
to-hand encounters. Out in the distant prairie behind the swamp 
forest, the second division of the British coming on heard the battle, 



46 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

hurried forward, and began to reach the spot while the low 
plain, wrapped in darkness, was still flashing with the discharge of 
artillery. 

The engagement was soon over, without special results beyond 
that prestige which we may be confident was, at the moment, Jackson's 
main aim. Before day he fell back two miles, and in the narrowest 
part of the plain, some four miles from town, began to make his per- 
manent line behind Rodriguez Canal. 

Inclement weather set in, increasing the hardships of friend and foe. 
The British toiled incessantly in the miry ground of the sugar-cane 
fields to bring up their heavy artillery, and both sides erected breast- 
works and batteries, and hurried forward their reinforcements. Skir- 
mishing was frequent, and to Jackson's raw levies very valuable. Red- 
hot shot from the British works destroyed the Carolina; but her arma- 
ment was saved and made a shore battery on the farther river bank. 
On New Year's day a few bales of cotton, forming part of the Ameri- 
can fortifications, were scattered in all directions and set on fire, and 
this was the first and last use made of this material during the cam- 
paign. When it had been called to General Jackson's notice that this 
cotton was the property of a foreigner, " Give him a gun and let him 
defend it," was his answer. On the -ith, two thousand two hundred 
and fifty Kentuckians, poorly clad and worse armed, arrived, and such 
as bore serviceable weapons raised Jackson's force to three thousand 
two hundred men on his main line ; a line, says the Duke of Saxe- 
Weimar, " the very feeblest an engineer could have devised ; that is, a 
straight one." 

Yet on this line the defenders of New Orleans were about to be 
victorious. It consisted of half a mile of very uneven earthworks 
stretching across the plain along the inner edge of the canal, from the 
river to the edge of the wood, and continuing a like distance into the 
forest. In here it quickly dwindled to a mere double row of logs two 
feet apart, filled in between with earth. The entire artillery on this 
whole line was twelve pieces. But it was served by men of rare skill, 
artillerists of the regular army, the sailors of the burnt Carolina, some 
old French soldiers under Flaujeac, one of Bonaparte's gunners, and 
Dominique and Beluche, with the tried cannoneers of their pirate 
ships. 

From battery to battery the rude line was filled out with a droll 
confusion of arms and trappings, men and dress. Here on the extreme 
right, just on and under the levee, were some regular infantry and a 
company of " Orleans Rifles," with some dragoons who served a how- 
itzer. Next to them was a battalion of Louisiana Creoles in gay and 
varied uniforms. The sailors of the Carolina were grouped around 



THE BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 47 

the battery between. In the Creoles' midst were the swarthy priva- 
teers with their two twenty-fours. Then came a battalion of native 
men of color, another bunch of sailors around a thirty-two-pounder, a 
battalion of St. Domingan mulattoes, a stretch of blue for some regu- 
lar artillery and the Forty-fourth infantry, then Flaujeac and his 
Francs behind a brass twelve-pounder ; next, a long slender line of 
brown homespun hunting-shirts that draped Carroll's lank Tennes- 
seeans, then a small, bright bunch of marines, then some more regular 
artillery behind a long brass culverine and a six-pounder, then Adair's 
ragged Kentuckians, and at the end, Coffee's Tennesseeans, disappear- 
ing in the swamp, where they stood by day knee-deep in water, and 
slept at night in the mud. 

Wintry rains had retarded everything in the British cam]) ; but at 
length Lambert's division came up, Packenham took command, and 
plans were perfected for the final attack. A narrow continuation of 
the canal by which the English had come up through the swam]) to 
its head at the rear of Villere's plantation was dug, so that their 
boats could be floated up to the river front close under the back of 
the levee, and then dragged over its top and launched into the river. 
The squalid negresses that fish for crawfish along its rank, flowery 
banks, still call it " Cannal Packin'am." All night of the 7th of Janu- 
ary there came to the alert ears of the Americans across the interven- 
ing plain a noise of getting boats through this narrow passage. It 
was evident that the decisive battle was impending. Packenham's 
intention was to throw a considerable part of his force across the 
river to attack the effective marine battery abreast of the American 
line, erected there by Commodore Paterson, while he, on the hither 
shore, unembarrassed by its fire on his flank, should fall furiously 
upon Jackson's main line, in three perpendicular columns. 

But the river had fallen. Colonel Thornton, who was to lead the 
movement on the farther bank, was long getting his boats across the 
levee. The current, too, was far swifter than it had seemed. Eight 
priceless hours slipped away, and only a third of the intended force 
crossed. 

A little before daybreak of the 8th, the British main force moved 
out of camp and spread across the plain, six thousand strong, the 
Americans in front, the river on their left, and the swamp-forest on 
their right. They had planned to begin at one signal the three 
attacks on the nearer and the one on the farther shore. The air was 
chilly and obscure. A mist was slowly clearing off from the wet and 
slippery ground. A dead silence reigned ; but in that mist and silence 
their enemy was waiting for them. Presently day broke and rap- 
idly brightened, the mist lifted a little, and the red lines of the British 



48 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

were fitfully descried from the American works. Outside the ievee 
the wide river and farther shore were quite hidden by the fog, which 
now and then floated hitherward over the land. 

Packenham was listening for the attack of Colonel Thornton 
on the opposite bank, that was to relieve his main assault from 
the cross-fire of Paterson's marine battery. The sun rose ; but he 
heard nothing. He waited till half -past seven; still there was no 
sound. 

Meanwhile the Americans lay in their long trench, peering over 
their sorry breastworks, and wondering at the inaction. But at 
length Packenham could wait no longer. A British rocket went up 
near the swamp. It was the signal for attack. A single cannon-shot 
answered from the Americans, and the artillery on both sides opened 
with a frightful roar. On Jackson's extreme left, some black troops 
of the British force made a feint against the line in the swamp, and 
were easily repulsed. On his right, near the river, the enemy charged 
in solid column, impetuously, upon a redoubt just in advance of the 
line. Twice only the redoubt could reply, and the British were over 
and inside and pressing on to scale the breastwork behind. Their 
brave and much-loved Colonel Rennie was leading them. But on the 
top of the works he fell dead with the hurrah on his lips, and they 
were driven back and out of the redoubt in confusion. 

Meantime the main attack was being made in the open plain near 
the edge of the swamp. Some four hundred yards in front of the 
American works lay a ditch. Here the English formed in close 
column of about sixty men front. They should have laid off their 
heavy knapsacks, for they were loaded besides with big fascines of 
ripe sugar-cane for filling up the American ditch, and with scaling- 
ladders. But with muskets, knapsacks and all, they gave three cheers 
and advanced. Before them went a shower of Congreve rockets. For 
a time they were partly covered by an arm of the forest and by the 
fog, but soon they emerged from both and moved steadily forward in 
perfect order, literally led to the slaughter in the brave old British 
way. 

" Where are you going ? " asked one English officer of another. 

" I'll be hanged if I know." 

" Then," said the first, " you have got into what I call a good 
thing ; a far-famed American battery is in front of you at a short range, 
and on the left of this spot is flanked, at eight hundred yards, by their 
batteries on the opposite side of the river." 

" The first objects we saw, enclosed as it were in this little world 
of mist," says this eye-witness, " were the cannon-balls tearing up the 
ground and crossing one another, and bounding along like so many 



THE BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 49 

cricket-balls through the air, coming on our left flank from the Ameri- 
can batteries on the right bank of the river, and also from their lines 
in front." 

The musketry fire of the Americans, as well as the artillery, was 
given with terrible precision. Unhappily for the English they had 
singled out for their attack those homely clad men whom they had nick- 
named the " Dirty shirts " — the riflemen of Kentucky and Tennessee 
— Indian fighters, that never fired but on a selected victim. Flau- 
jeac's battery tore out whole files of men. Yet the brave foe came 
on, veterans from the Cape of Good Hope and from the Spanish 
Peninsula, firmly and measuredly, and a few platoons had even 
reached the canal, when the column faltered, gave way, and fled 
precipitately back to the ditch where it had first formed. 

Here there was a rally. The knapsacks were taken off. Reen- 
forcements came up. The first charge had been a dreadful mistake 
in its lack of speed. Now the start was quicker and in less order, but 
again in the fatal columnar form. 

" At a run," writes the participant already quoted, " we neared 
the American line. The mist was now rapidly clearing away, but, 
owing to the dense smoke, we could not at first distinguish the attack- 
ing column of the British troops to our right. . . . The echo from 
the cannonade and musketry was so tremendous in the forests that 
the vibration seemed as if the earth were cracking and tumbling to 
pieces. . . . The flashes of fire looked as if coming out of the 
bowels of the earth, so little above its surface were the batteries of 
the Americans. ,, 

Packenham led the van. On a black horse, in brilliant uniform, 
waving his hat and cheering the onset, he was a mark the backwoods- 
men could not miss. Soon he reeled and fell from his horse with a 
mortal wound ; Gibbs followed him. Then Kean was struck and 
borne from the field with many others of high rank, and the column 
again recoiled and fell back, finally discomfited. 

" Did you ever see such a scene ? " cried one of Packenham's staff. 
" There is nothing left but the Seventh and Forty-third ! " 

" They fell," says another Englishman, " like the very blades of 
grass beneath the scythe of the mower. Seventeen hundred and 
eighty-one victims, including three generals, seven colonels, and seventy- 
five lesser officers, were the harvest of those few minutes." 

At length the American musketry ceased. Only the batteries 
were answering shot for shot, when from the further side of the 
Mississippi came, all too late, a few reports of cannon, a short, brisk 
rattle of fire-arms, a hush, and three British cheers to tell that the 
few raw American troops on that side had been overpowered, and 
4 



50 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

that Paterson's battery, prevented from defending itself by the 
blundering of the militia in its front, had been spiked and aban- 
doned. 

The batteries of the British line continued to fire until two in the 
afternoon ; but from the first signal of the morning to the abandon- 
ment of all effort to storm the American works was but one hour, and 
the battle of New Orleans was over at half -past eight. General Lam- 
bert reported the British loss two thousand and seventeen ; Jackson, 
the American at six killed and seven wounded. 

From the 9th to the 18th four British vessels bombarded Fort St. 
Philip without result ; on the morning of the 19th, the British camp 
in front of Jackson was found deserted, and eight days later the last 
of the enemies' forces embarked from the shores of Lake Borgne. 



THE FESTIVITY AFTER THE VICTORY. 

[From Jackson and New Orleans (1858).] 
BY ALEXANDER WALKER. 

[Alexander Walker was born in Fredericksburg, Va., October 13, 1819. Thence 
he removed to New Orleans, where he divided his time between practising law and writ- 
ing for the press. He was, at different periods, editor of many local newspapers, 
among them the Picayune. At a mature age, he was for some time a resident of Cin- 
cinnati, where he edited the Enquirer. He was, for a term or so, judge of the City Court 
of New Orleans, and in 1861 was a member of the Secession convention of Louisiana. 
He published Life of Andrew Jackson ; Jackson and Neio Orleans (1858) ; History of 
the Battle of Shiloh ; and Butler at New Orleans. He was a lover of words for their 
own sake, and in building up his sentences was ever ready to sacrifice economy to 
euphony. In writing history, the most trivial detail received his consideration. He 
died January 24, 1893.] 

The first display of popular feeling [after the battle of New 
Orleans] was too wild to be controlled by any regular method or 
system. At Jackson's request the Abbe Dubourg, Apostolic Prefect 
of the State of Louisiana, appointed the 23d as a day of public 
thanksgiving to the Almighty, for his signal interposition in behalf 
of the safety and honor of the country. That day was ushered in by 
a discharge of artillery, which caused many a citizen and soldier to 
leap from his pleasant couch, under the delusion that it was all a 
dream, that his toil was over and the enemy had really departed. 
New Orleans, never before or since, exhibited so gay and happy a 
scene, as on that bright 23d of January, 1815. All the contentions, 
horrors, sufferings, and troubles of the war were forgotten, and a 
spirit of unrestrained happiness, of cordial harmony and good-will, 
pervaded the whole population. . . . 

The old cathedral was burnished up for the occasion. Evergreens 
decorated the entrance and the interior. The Public Square, or Plaza, 
blazed with beauty, splendor, and elegance. In its centre stood a 
graceful triumphal arch, supported by six Corinthian columns, and 
festooned with evergreens and flowers. Beneath the arch stood two 
young children on pedestals, holding a laurel wreath, whilst near 
them, as if their guardian angels, was a bright damsel representing 
Liberty, and a more sedate one personifying Justice. From the arch 
to the entrance of the cathedral the loveliest girls of the city had been 
ranged in two rows, to represent the various States and Territories. 



52 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

They were dressed in pure white, with blue veils and silver stars on 
their brows. Each bore a small flag, inscribed with the name of the 
State she represented, and a small basket trimmed with blue ribands 
and full of flowers. Behind each a shield and lance were stuck in the 
ground, with the name, motto and seal of each of the States. The 
shields were linked together with verdant festoons, which extended 
from the arch to the door of the cathedral. 

Precisely at the appointed time, General Jackson appeared with 
his staff at the gate of the plaza fronting the river. He was received 
with salvos of artillery. Entering the square, he was conducted to 
the arch, where the two little girls, reaching forward with blushing, 
smiling faces, placed the laurel wreath on his brow. What a benign 
smile relieved the sternness of that heroic countenance, when the inno- 
cent faces of the pretty little ones arose to his view, as with so much 
pride and delight they performed the high task assigned to them! 
Who would not be stern and heroic in defence of those dear ones \ 
Who would not incur every peril, as well against the jealousy and dis- 
content of friends, as against the open hostilities of foes, in such a 
cause ? 

Such were, no doubt, the reflections that passed through a mind, 
which combined in an extraordinary degree the strong and tender 
traits of humanity. And now, with the laurel on his brow, amid the 
enthusiastic shouts of the people, he descends the stairs of the arch, 
and is met by a lovely young lady, radiant with all the charms of 
Creole beauty — with face, form, manners, and expression, such as the 
most aspiring artist might have dreamed of as the model for his Venus. 
Fit representative of Louisiana, this beautiful damsel addresses the 
laureled chief in a speech glowing with gratitude and eloquence. All 
the rigor has faded from that stern countenance, and the victorious 
General humbles himself at the shrine of female beauty and innocence, 
and replies, in words that thrill with emotion, that his merits have 
been exalted far, far above their real worth. But the modest confes- 
sion is drowned by a shower of flowers, amid which, the Hero, sup- 
ported by his staff, is led to the entrance of the cathedral. Here he 
is met by the patriotic and revered Abbe Dubourg, clad in pontifical 
robes and supported by a college of priests. The reverend gentleman 
addresses him in a speech of more than ordinary eloquence, in which, 
whilst due praise is accorded to the Hero, the ascription of the higher 
glory is given to that Divine Source of all wisdom and goodness, by 
whose inspiration and influence those signal services were directed to 
the salvation of the country and the confusion and defeat of her 
enemies. Jackson replies briefly, tastefully, and modestly. He is 
then conducted into the cathedral and escorted to a conspicuous seat 



THE FESTIVITY AFTER THE VICTOR}'. 53 

near the altar. Te Deum is then chanted in the grand and impres- 
sive manner in which that melodious outburst of gratitude is usually 
rendered by the choirs of the Roman Catholic Church. The people 
join in the noble hymn. The gallant battalion d'Orleans guards the 
entrance of the cathedral and fills the aisles. The war-worn counte- 
nances of the young Creoles next to the person of the General, are 
objects of warmest regard to the hundreds of mothers, wives, sisters 
and lovers, who crowd the interior of the cathedral on this joyful 
occasion. 

The ceremony being concluded, Jackson retired to his quarters. 
That night the whole city was illuminated. At last, the people, 
wearied by the wild enthusiasm and inexhaustible joyfulness of the 
great event, sunk into slumbers that were no longer disturbed by 
dreams of sack, ruin, bloodshed, and devastation. And so concluded 
the triumphal festivity of New Orleans, which had been so miracu- 
lously saved from dishonor and destruction. 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. 

[From Harper's Magazine. Copyright, 1888, by Harper & Brothers.] 
BY CHARLES GAYAERE. 

For a long while [in Louisiana] it was almost of absolute necessity 
that the judges should understand both the English and French lan- 
guages ; and in consequence of the motley composition of our cosmopo- 
lite population, there was in every court a permanently appointed 
interpreter, who, as a sworn and regular officer thereof, translated the 
evidence, the testimony of the witnesses, and, when necessary, the 
charges of the judge to the jurors. Our jurisprudence was based on 
the laws of Spain and on the Napoleon Code, which had been adopted 
by our Legislature with such modifications as had been thought advis- 
able. The commentaries of French and Spanish jurists, with decis- 
ions of the tribunals of the two countries of which Louisiana had 
successively been the colon} 7 , were daily and extensively quoted as 
authorities. The juries being composed of men some of whom did not 
understand one word of French, and others equally as ignorant of the 
English, it became imperative on litigants to employ in each case on 
both sides two lawyers, one speaking French, the other English, and 
supposed to command individually the sympathies of that portion of 
the population to which they belonged. Under such circumstances 
and exigencies the trial of cases was necessarily long and expensive. 
The petitions and answers, the citations, and all writs whatever, were 
usually in both languages ; and the records containing the testimony 
of witnesses, and original documents with their indispensable trans- 
lations, were oppressively voluminous. 

Will the reader accompany me to one of the district courts of the 
old regime, and witness some of the judicial proceedings of the epoch ( 
The presiding judge is Joshua Lewis, a high-minded gentleman, if not 
a profound jurist, who commands universal esteem in the community 
where he has come to reside. As irreproachable in his private as in 
his public life, Judge Lewis was born in Kentucky, and did honor 
both to his native and to his adopted State. When the British in- 
vaded Louisiana he hastened to descend from the bench, shouldered 
his rifle, and bravely met them on the plains of Chalmette. Asso- 
ciating much with the ancient population, he had learned but a little 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. 55 

of their language, sufficient, however, to state in a few words, clearly 
if not grammatically, to a jury who understood only French, what 
law was applicable to the case on which they were to decide. 

The lawyers retained in the case to be tried are Alfred Hennen for 
the plaintiff, an Anglo-Saxon American, and Etienne Mazureau for the 
defendant, a French Creole. Hennen is from New England. He is 
a tall, well-formed, massive man, with a handsome, benevolent face, 
glowing with the warm tints of a florid complexion, which denotes 
his Northern origin. He is invincibly self-possessed, and no provoca- 
tion can throw him off his guard in his fortress of cold and passionless 
reserve. Nothing can ruffle his temper ; and if the attempt is made 
he turns it off with a good-natured laugh, which blunts the edge of 
his adversary's weapon. He is an erudite, but plain, dry, plodding, 
practical lawyer, who never aims at any fancy flight of eloquence. 
He has a large and well-furnished library, which he liberally puts at 
the disposal of his friends. He is laboriously industrious, and always 
comes into court with a long string of authorities, which he uses as a 
lasso to throw round the neck of his opponent. He is not much 
addicted to urge upon the court argumentative deductions from the 
broad principles of jurisprudence, but prefers relying on an over- 
whelming avalanche of precedents and numerous decisions, gathered 
from far and wide, in cases which he deems similar to his own. His 
fees amount to a large income, of which he takes thrif tj care, although 
he lives according to the exigencies of his social position. He is a 
conspicuous and worthy member of the Presbyterian Church. He is 
abstemious in his habits, very fond of exercise on horseback and on 
foot, and a strict observer of the rules and prescriptions of hygiene. 
Like all members of the legal profession from the other States of the 
Union, he much prefers the common to the civil law, the latter being 
looked upon by them as an abortive creation of the Latin mind, which 
they hold, of course, to be naturally inferior to the Anglo-Saxon 
intellect. 

The lawyer on the other side is Etienne Mazureau, a native of 
France, who has emigrated to Louisiana in search of a better fortune, 
and who in a few years has risen to be one of the magnates of the 
New Orleans bar. Of a medium size, compactly built, with flashing- 
dark eyes, intensely black hair, and a brown complexion, he is a per- 
fect specimen of the Southern type, as if to the manner and to the 
manor born. He is of an ardent temperament, and the sacred fire of 
the orator glows in his breast. He is an adroit and most powerful 
logician, but on certain occasions his eloquence becomes tempestuous. 
He delights in all the studies appertaining to his profession, and pos- 
sesses a most extensive and profound knowledge of the civil law, from 



56 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

the twelve tables of Rome and the Institutes of Justinian to the 
Napoleon Code. He is also thoroughly familiar with the Spanish 
jurisprudence, which is derived from the same source. He is deeply 
versed in the common law, which, however, when the opportunity 
presents itself, it is his special pleasure to ridicule and treat with spite- 
ful depreciation. He is not free from a certain degree of arrogance, 
based on the consciousness he has of his learning and of the superiority 
of his splendid intellectual powers. When irritated by what he thinks 
futile contradiction, he has a provoking way of throwing back his 
head, and of superciliously lifting at a right angle with surrounding 
objects a nose whose nostrils dilate with contempt. He is particularly 
elated when in his forensic conflicts he triumphs over an Anglo-Saxon 
member of the bar to whom he happens to have taken a special dislike. 
His voice is superb, now calmly argumentative, now tremulous with 
passion, and frequently derisive, with sneers and sarcasms as sharply 
pointed as the savagest arrow. Aggressive by nature, he sometimes 
affects the most dulcet tones of conciliatory placidity, and when he 
thus transforms himself he is more to be dreaded than when he is 
apparently in one of his fiercest moods. He is a terror to the wit- 
nesses of the adverse party, whom he likes to browbeat and to keep 
broiling on the gridiron of his torturing inquisition. His invectives, 
Avhen prompted by indignation, wrath, or any other cause of excite- 
ment, are a sort of tropical hurricane. He is too proud and lofty to 
ever have recourse to the petty trickeries and snap judgments of the 
minnows of his noble profession, and never takes any undue and un- 
gentlemanly advantage of his brethren at law. He is equally great 
and successful in civil and criminal cases. Hence his income is very 
large ; but he has a peculiar knack at getting into debt and parting 
with his money in the most unaccountable manner. He has this 
characteristic in common with many men of splendid abilities, through 
whose pockets silver and gold run as through a sieve, much to the 
mortification of their creditors. 

These were the two men pitted against each other in the case to 
which we call the attention of the reader. The plaintiff had bought a 
tract of land measuring, as stated in the act of sale, twenty arpents, 
fronting the Mississippi, and running on that line from an oak on the 
lower limit to a willow on the upper one. After the completion of 
the sale and payment of the price, it was discovered that the front of 
the tract measured twenty-five arpents instead of twenty. The pur- 
chaser claimed these twenty-five arpents, but the defendant was will- 
ing to surrender only twenty. Hence the suit brought by the plaintiff 
to be put in possession of what he claimed to have bought and paid 
for, and therefore his property. 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. 5*3 

Hennen had made himself acquainted with the French language, 
and Mazureau spoke English with great fluency, so that, contrary to 
what habitually took place, there was but one lawyer employed on 
either side. 

" Oyez ! oyez ! The honorable First District Court of the State 
of Louisiana is in session ! " cries the sheriff in a loud and clear voice. 
" Gentlemen of the jury summoned in this case," says the clerk, 
" please answer to your names." After this is done, the jurors are 
called to the sacred book. 

Here a struggle ensues between the two lawyers about the com- 
position of the jury. Hennen challenges as many of the Creoles and 
naturalized French as he can, and Mazureau does the same with the 
Americans. At last the jury is formed — nine of the Latin race, and 
three of the Anglo-Saxon. On Mazureau's lips may be seen a smile 
of satisfaction. Hennen has a troubled look. Let us give a little of 
our attention to the manner in which that jury had been sworn. 

( lerk to the first juror : " You swear that " — 

First Juror: ," Je rtentends pas. Pa/rUz frcmgcds." (I don't 
understand. Speak French.) 

Clerk : " All right; 1 

And the oath is administered in French. 

Second juror approaches to qualify. 

Clerk: " Vbus jurez que" — 

Second Juror : " I don't understand. Speak English." 

Clerk : " All right." 

And the second juror, duly sworn in his vernacular, takes his seat; 
and so on to the last of the twelve, each one insisting on being 
addressed in his own maternal tongue. 

Judge: "Mr. Augustin Macarty, I appoint you foreman of this 
jury." 

On hearing which, Mazureau allows again an expression of ap- 
proval to beam all over his face. Macarty is of an ancient and high- 
toned family. Lie has served several years as mayor of the city, and 
is uncompromisingly conservative in all his views and feelings — the 
very embodiment of the old regime. It was he who, in his official 
capacity, as reported, and backed by public opinion, had caused the 
first cargo of ice brought to New Orleans to be thrown into the river 
as a measure of public safety, because cold drinks in the summer would 
affect throats and lungs, and would make consumptive the whole popu- 
lation. He might have added, perhaps with more propriety, that 
liquor refrigerated by ice might become more tempting, more provoca- 
tive of thirst, and that the sweet indulgence might lead to a habit 
injurious to health. Be it as it may, we will venture to say something 



58 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. ' 

in support of the objection of dear old Macarty to the introduction of 
this new crystallized luxury. Are we sure that he was as absurdly 
ridiculous as some people may think, when we recollect that consump- 
tion, now so common among us, was almost unknown before the arrival 
of that ill-fated ship with its load of hyperborean product, which was 
soon succeeded by more welcome importations of the same kind ? But 
let us return to the trial. 

Hennen rises, and after a slight bow to the court and jury, reads 
to them the petition and answer, written in English and French as 
required. Then he says : " This case, as your honor sees, is founded 
on Article 2495 of the Civil Code, which reads as follows : 

" ' There can he neither increase nor diminution of price on account 
of disagreement in measure when the object is designated by the adjoin- 
ing tenements and sold from boundary to boundary.'' 

" This is the law on which is based the claim of my client. As to 
the facts alleged in the plaintiff's petition, they are admitted by the 
defendant, who demands five thousand dollars more for the five 
arpents fronting the river, with the usual depth of forty arpents ; but 
he is not entitled to that increase of price, considering that the extent 
on the front line was designated by an oak and a willow that clearly 
marked the boundaries of the tract. If there were between these 
designated limits only fifteen arpents instead of twenty, the purchaser, 
my client, would be entitled to no diminution of the price to be paid 
by him, and on the same principle, when there are twenty-five arpents 
instead of twenty, the defendant cannot claim an increase of the sum 
for which the sale has been effected. This is made so plain by the 
words of the article of the Civil Code cited by me that I cannot con- 
ceive the object of the defendant in incurring the expenses of this 
litigation. He cannot but know that the verdict of this jury, con- 
firmed by your honor, will be against him, and probably he only aims, 
for some purpose which I cannot imagine, at retaining possession as 
long as he can of the property for which he has received the stipulated 
price." 

Then turning to the jury, he said : " Gentlemen, as the facts in 
this case are admitted, I have no evidence to introduce. It now 
becomes your duty to apply the law to those facts, and its text is so 
plain that its meaning cannot be a matter of doubt in anybody's 
mind." 

During this address, which we summarily reproduce, the French 
and Creole members of the jury had been showing signs of impatience, 
and it ended in this interrogation from Foreman Macarty : " Mr. 
Hennen, do you really presume to induce us to grant twenty-five 
arpents to your client when the act of sale only says twenty ? " 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. 59 

Hennen : " The words of the contract are that the plaintiff bought 
a tract of land of twenty arpents, with the usual depth, extending, on 
the line fronting the river, from a certain oak to a certain willow that 
indicated the boundaries. As to the law, it says that the designation 
of visible limits, and not the specification of the number of arpents 
mentioned, is the criterion to ascertain the area of the land intended 
to be transferred by the seller to the purchaser." 

Foreman Macarty, after having exchanged, in a whisper, a few 
hasty words with his French colleagues, takes a square attitude in his 
seat, with all the indications of a man who is going to assert an irrev- 
ocable decision. He fixes a steady eye on Hennen, and says, in a 
peremptory tone : 

" Mr. Hennen, we are satisfied that the defendant never intended to 
sell, nor the plaintiff to buy, more than twenty arpents fronting the 
river. We don't care for your oak and your willow. It is useless for 
you to trouble us with such a preposterous claim. Your client is not 
honest, sir. It is wrong on his part to try to avail himself of an evi- 
dent mistake of the defendant as to the quantity of land he thought 
he was selling. He certainly would have asked a larger sum if he had 
not been deceived on the subject. We are indignant, sir ! " 

Hennen, blandly : " I regret, Mr. Macarty, your misconception of 
the case. Allow me to say to you that I regret it for the sake of the 
two parties to this suit. If you persist in your views, if a verdict is 
rendered against the plaintiff, I will certainly appeal to the Supreme 
Court, who will reverse it. Meanwhile you will have done an injury 
to my client, whose taking possession of the land he has paid for will 
be delayed to his detriment, and by the prolongation of this litigation 
you will be the cause of inflicting on the defendant heavier costs than 
he would otherwise have had to pay. I beg the Court to instruct the 
jury as to the law which is to govern their final decision." 

Judge : " Gentlemen of the jury, Mr. Hennen has correctly quoted 
the law to you. Your duty is to enforce its application in accordance 
with the legislative will, and not to suit your own individual notions 
of the just or unjust." 

Macarty : " We beg leave to remain mindful of a higher law than 
the one which we are desired to enforce, a law implanted in our hearts 
by God himself — the law of honesty, the law of conscience." 

Judge : " I feel bound to tell you that I believe the Supreme Court 
will not sanction your views, and will probably reverse your verdict.'" 

Macarty : " That is the affair of the Supreme Court. Ours is to act 
according to our conscience." 

This conversation had been carried on in French. All the while 
the three Anglo-Saxon members of the jury looked vacantly at every 



GO HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

object in the court-room, and probably were wondering at the cause 
and meaning of all this hubbub. As to Mazureau, he seemed to be in 
a satisfactory condition of mind, and had been repeatedly giving nods 
of approbation whenever Macarty spoke. Raising his spectacles high 
up < >n his forehead above his brows, which with him was known to be 
a sign that he considered his work done, and that he could rest con- 
tented, he had thrown himself back on his chair, which he caused to ' 
tilt on its hind legs, and it was evident that he was keenly enjoying 
his adversary's prompt defeat, when it had not been necessary for him 
even to utter a single word to bring about this result. 

But Ilennen was not a man to be easily discouraged, and getting a 
little more animated than was his habit, he said : " Gentlemen of the ■ 
jury, allow me, under the pleasure of the Court, to state to you respect- 
fully that it is the conscience of the law that you are bound to consult 
here, and not your self-assumed notions of right and wrong, or what 
you call your conscience, in administering justice in the courts of jowy 
country in conformity with the obligations of the solemn oath which 
you have taken. There is not a lawyer at the bar who will not tell 
you that this is the correct doctrine to be adopted by you in the dis- 
charge of your duties as jurors. I even appeal on this point to the 
eloquent orator, to the profound jurist, to whom we all look as a safe 
guide in all matters of law. I appeal to Mr. Mazureau himself, who 
appears here for the defendant." 

A sneering expression of cynical triumph which had spread over 
Mazureau's face immediately vanished ; he put on an air of sympa- 
thetic compassion for the embarrassment in which his opponent found 
himself, and in that ominously most dulcet tone of voice which he 
sometimes assumed, and which was generally indicative of the forth- 
coming of some fatal thrust, he said : " Mr. Hennen, will you permit 
me to address you one question ? " 

Hennen : " Certainly, sir ; at your pleasure." 

Mazureau : " Are you not from Xew England ( " 

Hennen : " Yes, sir." 

Mazureau : " Well, in that land of your nativity, was it not lawful 
to burn old women as witches ? " 

Hennen, looking somewhat perplexed, stammered out : " It occasion- 
ally happened — in former times." 

* Mazureau sprang up with flashing eyes, shaking his fist dramati- 
cally at Hennen, and with a loud burst of his sonorous voice he thun- 
dered out : " Would you have executed that law I AVould you have 
burned old women at the stake ? Would you have lighted up the fire \ 
Which of the two authorities would you have obeyed on that occasion 
— that conscience which God has placed in your heart, or the fanatical 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. 61 

dictate of an impious legislation ? I will not insult you by doubting 
your choice. And now how is it that you expect these high-minded 
men, these intelligent jurors, to do what you would not yourself have 
done ? Why should they not in these days follow the example which 
you would have given them in former times, which is, to trample upon 
anv immoral and nefarious law that violates the most sacred feelings 
of conscience and the principles of common justice between man and 
man I " 

He paused, as if to take breath and alloAv his emotion to subside. 
Then, with calm dignity : " May it please the Court, I have no more 
to say. The case is closed on my part." And he looked significantly 
at the French and Creole members of the jury, who could hardly 
refrain from loudly expressing their applause. 

Hennen stood bewildered for a minute or two, but recoverina- him- 
self, he said : " May it please the Court, I have only a few words to 
address to those members of the jury who do not understand French." 
After this had been done, a short charge was delivered by the judge 
in English and in French, and the jury retired to their room. Every- 
body present thought that they could not possibly agree. 

In their chamber, as soon as they entered it, the jurors of the Latin 
race grouped themselves in a corner, talking excitedly, and looking 
doggedly determined not to yield an inch to the Yankees, who had 
sought the opposite corner, and were whispering together. This is 
what one of those Yankees said to his colleagues : " I cannot stay here 
long. I have most pressing business to attend to, and you also, I pre- 
sume/ ' There was an assenting movement of the head from those 
who were thus addressed. " "Well," continued he, " this is a plain case. 
There should be a verdict for the plaintiff. But those French and 
Creoles have no sense, you know. They are the creatures of prejudice 
or whim. They are not practical. Besides, they are particularly ob- 
stinate ; and as they never have anything to do, they will keep us here 
locked up God knows how long. Had we not better humor them '. It 
will do no harm to the plaintiff, for, as Hennen says, the Supreme 
Court will surely reverse our verdict." 

This suggestion being accepted, the Anglo-Saxon, advancing toward 
Macarty and pointing to the record which that gentleman held in his 
hand, said, with a look and tone of interrogation, " Vmts, monsieur, f or 
plaintiff, eh % " Macarty shook his head negatively. " For defendant \ " 
Macarty gave an affirmative nod. "Eh Hen, nous aussi" (Well, we 
too), continued the Saxon, calling to his assistance these French words 
which he recollected, and which he put together as well as he could, 
whilst he pointed to his two friends as concurring in his opinion. 

Macarty understood the words and the action. His face became 



C2 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

radiant, and he exclaimed, " Je vois avec satisfaction, messieurs, que vous 
avez de l'honneur et de la conscience, et que vous n'etes pas homines 
a donner vingt-cinq arpents a qui n'en a achete que vingt. Allons, 
c'est bien ; c'est tres bien." (I see with satisfaction, gentlemen, that 
you are men of honor and have a conscience, and that you are not the 
men to give twenty-five arpents to one who has bought only twenty. 
It is well ; it is very well indeed.) 

Whereupon there was a general shaking of hands, and the jury 
returned to the court-room. The clerk announced, " Yerdict for the 
defendant." 

w " Mr. Sheriff, discharge the jury, ,, said the astonished judge. 

Hennen : " May it please the Court, I beg leave to file my motion 
of appeal from this extraordinary verdict." 

The judge nods assent, and descends slowly from the bench. Mazu- 
reau approaches Hennen, who is handing some papers to the clerk. 
They look at each other face to face, and both laugh heartily. They 
seem to be much amused at something. 

Mazureau pulls out his Avatch : " Oh, oh ! already four o'clock. It 
is dinner-time. Hennen, my house is close by. I have to-day a fat 
turkey aux t/ruffes, and exquisite claret just received from Bordeaux. 
Suppose you join me ? " 

" Willingly." 

And the two eminent lawyers went away arm in arm. 

Let us witness another jury trial, in which it happens that the two 
races are again divided. This contingency has been provided for, and 
it has been thought prudent on both sides to employ two lawyers, one 
speaking English and the other French. John R. Grymes, of Vir- 
ginia, and Dominique Seghers, of Belgium, for plaintiff; Edward 
Livingston, of New York, and Moreau Lislet, of France, for de- 
fendant. 

John R. Grymes claims to belong to one of the first families of 
Virginia, and of course is not destitute of a coat-of-arms. He is an 
elegant, distingue looking man, above the middle size, always fashion- 
ably well dressed, always systematically courteous. He brings to the 
bar some of the etiquette and forms observed in the saloons of refined 
society. He is never boisterous, loud, passionate, and rough in his 
tone and gesticulations. As an orator he could not rise to the altitude 
where dwell the thunder and lightning of heaven ; he remains on 
earth, where, whatever may be for him the disadvantage of the sandy 
plain on which he stands, he wields with admirable effect the light, 
flexible, brightly polished, but cold Damascus steel blade of Saladin. 
As a lawyer, he has a lucid, logical mind, and speaks with the richest 
fluency, never being at a loss or hesitating about a word ; but that 



TEE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. 63 

word, although presenting itself with the utmost ease and confidence, 
is not always the proper one. His style is far from being classical, or 
even grammatical, but it is effective, it is persuasive, and the meaning 
which it intends to convey is understood without effort, even by the 
dullest. His pronunciation denotes at once his Virginian origin ; but 
his voice is musical, and his easy, pleasing flow of speech leaves no 
time and no desire to the hearer to analyze its constructive elements. 

There is nothing of the scholar in Grymes ; his collegiate education 
has been imperfect ; his reading is not extensive as to legal lore, nor 
anything else. But there is infinite charm in his natural eloquence, 
and his powerful native intellect knows how to make the most skilful 
use of the materials which it gathers at random outside of any regular 
course of study and research. He has the reputation of never prepar- 
ing himself for the trial even of important cases, and he seems pleased 
to favor the spreading of that impression. He affects to come into 
court after a night of dissipation, and to take at once all his points 
and all the information which he needs from his associate in the case, 
and even from what he can elicit from his opponents during the trial. 
It is when he pretends to be least prepared, and has apparently to rely 
only on intuition and the inspiration of the moment, that his brightest 
and most successful efforts are made. Many have some doubts about 
.the genuine reality of this phenomenon, and believe that Grymes 
works more in secret than he wants the public to know. 

Wo man was ever more urbanely sarcastic in words or pantomime. 
If the Court disagrees with him on any vital point, and lays down the 
law adversely to his views, he has a way of gracefully and submis- 
sively bowing to the decision with a half -suppressed smile of derision, 
and with an expression of the face which clearly says to the by- 
standers : " I respect the magistrate, as you see, but what a goose 
that fellow is ! " There is in his habitual sneers a sort of amiability, 
a good-natured love of piquant fun, which protects them against the 
suspicion of malignity; the shafts of his gilded bow scratch gently 
the skin with a perfumed steel point. He is a Chesterfield in his 
deportment toward all his colleagues of the bar; but if too much 
chafed by any of them he snorts once or twice, as if attempting to 
expel some obstruction from his nostrils. This is a sign in him of 
rising hostility, and without losing his temper he becomes politely 
aggressive, and his usually edulcorated language assumes a sort of 
vitriolic pungency. No one possesses better than he does the art of 
ridiculing without giving positive offence. But he is careful to use 
it sparingly in court, although profusely addicted to it in social 
intercourse. He is extremely fond of advocating with the utmost 
gravity wild paradoxes, which he frequently makes the amusing sub- 



64 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. . 

jects of conversation. He stands among the highest in his profession, 
and exercises great influence over judges and jurors. 

He has a decided taste for luxurious living, for horse-racing, cock- 
fighting, and card-gambling. He would not brook the shadow of a 
word of disparagement, and on a point of honor would immediately. 
like all Southern gentlemen, appeal to the arbitration of the duello. 
Notwithstanding this sensitiveness, and the considerable fees which he 
annually receives for his services as a very able and popular member 
of the bar, there are few men known to be more dunned than he is. 
But he possesses privileges and immunities to which nobody else could 
aspire ; he is the Richard Brinsley Sheridan of New Orleans. For 
instance, as an example of the liberties which he takes, if dunned too 
actively, he will give a check on any bank of which he bethinks him- 
self at the moment, and the person who presents it becomes an object 
of merriment. It is looked upon as done in fun. There is not, of 
course, any idea of swindling or of doing any real impropriety. It is 
only one of Grymes's practical jokes. He will pay in the end, as 
everybody knows, with any amount of interest in addition, and with- 
out questioning the rate. 

In those days of strongly marked individualities in New Orleans 
there was a man famous for collecting money from the most obdurate 
debtors, and he therefore was the favorite agent of creditors. His 
name was Dupeux. He was a terror to all those who indulged in the 
fancy that they could escape from the payment of what they owed. 
It might have been possible if there had been no Dupeux in the world, 
but as there was a Dupeux, it was impossible. He was the constable 
of one of our justices of the peace, but he never himself resorted to 
law. He had other means of coercion in his bag. Once on the track 
of a debtor, he never lost sight of him. That debtor felt at once that 
he was doomed, for he soon discovered that he was haunted more 
frightfully than by a ghost. Wherever he was, by day and by night, 
if there Avas any imaginable access to him, there suddenly stood in his 
presence the inevitable Dupeux, with his pale, supplicating face, ex- 
pressive of the agony of too long deferred hope of payment, and with 
the same Gorgon bill in his hand. No tempest of curses and threats 
could frighten him away never to return ; and when his bodily pres- 
ence could be avoided, still his mournful, piteous face and its mute 
appeal remained visible through the debtor's imagination. It became 
an insupportable obsession, and it sometimes happened that, to get rid 
of it, the persecuted victim of debt would in a fit of desperation start 
in pursuit of Dupeux to hasten a payment which had been hitherto 
pertinaciously delayed or absolutely refused. 

Such was the individual who, one morning very early, met Grymes 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. G5 

sallying from a house where he had gambled with friends during the 
whole night. Dupeux approached reverentially the great lawyer, and 
with a pathetic gesture presented the bill for which he had been dun- 
ning that personage for several months. " Ah, my friend ! " exclaimed 
Grymes, " what a lucky coincidence ! You happen to meet me when I 
am flush. By-the-bye, put off that doleful face of yours ; it gives me 
the chills. Well, how much is the bill, Dupeux — my poor Dupeux \ " 

" Twenty-five dollars, Mr. Grymes.'" 

" Is that all % My conscience smites me for having made you wait 
so long, and you have been so patient, too ! You are an angel, Du- 
peux — my poor Dupeux ! " And he pulled out of his pocket a very 
large bundle of bank-notes, from which he extracted one, that he 
handed over to the collector, saying, " Pay yourself." 

" This is a one-hundred-dollar note, Mr. Grymes. How can I get 
change at this hour when all the banks and shops are closed \ " said 
Dupeux, in a whining tone. " Have you not smaller notes ? " 

" Trouble not yourself about the change, my friend ; keep it all, 
Dupeux — my poor Dupeux ! Let the balance of seventy-five dollars 
go toward indemnifying you for all the shoes that you have worn in 
your perambulations after me. Good-by, and may you have an appe- 
tite for breakfast, Dupeux — my poor Dupeux ! " 

Such was John R. Grymes, the most careless of men about money, 
coining it by the bushel, and squandering it in the same way. But 
toward the end of his life he became more economical, honorably paid 
all his debts, and left to his family a competency when he died at a 
ripe old age. 

Dominique Seghers, his colleague in the suit, was a perfect type of 
the red-tape old French avoue of the ancient regime. He looked into 
every case intrusted to his care eon ant ore, almost with paternal affec- 
tion. For, was he not to give it a legal existence, a judicial shape or 
form, that would be faultless \ Besides, he loved to handle and manip- 
ulate the law, so as to show what his skill could do with it. Such 
is the love of the artist for the instrument to which he is indebted for 
his fortune and his fame. The very moment a subject of litigation 
was placed in his hands, he doubted not of its being founded in law, 
and if that law was not apparent, he felt convinced that by dint of 
patient researches he would discover in the end that the projected 
suit could be based on some article of the Civil Code, some special 
statute, some applicable precedent, some decision of court, if not on 
the broad principles of jurisprudence. For him professionally there 
was no right or wrong outside of the text of the law. Everything 
else was vaporous sentimentality, sheer romance. 

He was essentially practical. To go to court was to go to war, 
5 



66 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

and the participants in it were to take the consequences. Strategic 
manoeuvres ending in a surprise that defeated a too confident or 
inexperienced adversary were, according to his views, nothing but fair 
play. As to himself, he went into the conflict armed to the teeth with 
every offensive and defensive weapon, from the big gun of massive 
argument to the penknife quibble of the smallest size. For who 
knows but what the feather may be adjudged of weight, when the 
granite block will be declared to have none % Who knew this better 
than Seghers < And thus he neglected nothing to insure success. It 
was his business to gain his case : that of the court or of the jury was 
to decide correctly. If they erred, whose responsibility was it ? Not 
his surely if in duty to his client he had misled them by some ign is 
fatu us. Within the precincts of the court, within the range of his 
profession, he proceeded with the caution of an Indian creeping 
stealthily into the territory of a hostile tribe, and looking anxiously 
for an enemy behind every bush and tree. He gave no quarter, and 
asked for none. 

There never was a microscope more effective than the one with 
which Seghers examined every word, every syllable, every comma, in 
his adversary's pleadings, and there never was any false step, any 
negligence, any defect or omission of legal formalities, of which old 
Seghers hesitated to take immediate advantage. I say " old Seghers," 
because in my youth I never heard his name mentioned without the 
addition of that adjective. It seemed as if he had never been sus- 
pected of ever having been young. 

Nothing could have been more instructive for a young practitioner 
than to study attentively every petition or answer that Seghers ever 
filed in court. They were written with a skill and minute care that 
defied criticism. It was evident that he had left no loop-hole through 
which his opponent could stick a pin, and woe to that opponent if he 
got entangled in the spiders web against which he bumped his head ! 
As to himself, he never entered any battle-field of litigation unless 
encased in a double-plated suit of armor ten inches in thickness, and 
without having protected his position, whenever it was possible, with 
all sorts of pitfalls and traps. 

He had to contend against a peculiar and very serious impediment 
for a man of his profession. It was the extreme difficulty which he 
had to express himself. In court he painfully struggled for words. 
They stuck in his throat ; and when at last they came out, it was as if 
they had forced their way through an obstructed passage. It was in 
a jumbling sort of way. There was an elbowing, a pushing, a tramp- 
ling upon one another, as people generally do when in a too closely 
packed crowd. But he patiently took his time to evolve order out of 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN 1823. ■ 67 

confusion. No interruptions from court or jury, or from the adverse 
party, however frequently repeated, could put him out of countenance. 
If continued too long, for the evident purpose of increasing the dis- 
array of his words, if not of his ideas, and enfeebling his laboriously 
uttered arguments, he would stop, and phlegmatically show his annoy- 
ance at it by merely turning up his eyes to heaven, seemingly as a 
mute appeal for the grant of sufficient patience to support him under 
the inflicted vexations. But after a while he would start again, in his 
humdrum style, precisely from the point where the thread of his dis- 
course had been cut off. 

I need not mention, for it might be easily inferred, that in his 
every-day life Seghers was as methodical and precise as in his pro- 
fessional one. His physical appearance would easily have denoted the 
inward man to a physiognomist. There was a great deal of character 
in his features. They were strongly marked— a sharp, long face ; a 
large mouth ; a much-protruding and big nose ; gray eyes partici- 
pating of the elongated olive shape, with furtive and oblique glances 
to detect anything suspicious, from whatever part of the horizon it 
might come ; large flat ears that stuck close to the sides of the head, 
and for which no approach of a velvet-footed cat would have been 
noiseless. This gentleman acquired by his profession a considerable 
fortune. 

Anions: the Americans who had come to New Orleans to better 
their fortune, none was so distinguished as Edward Livingston. He 
was of an illustrious family, and before emigrating to the extreme 
South he had been mayor of the city of New York. He had not been 
long in the place which he had chosen for his new sphere of action 
before he gave ample evidence of his superb talents. He at once 
became one of the leading members of the bar, notwithstanding his 
having enemies who spread evil reports against him, and his having 
incurred a great deal of unpopularity in consequence of the part he 
took in the famous " batture case," which gave rise to riots in New 
Orleans and to an acrimonious controversy between Thomas Jefferson 
and himself, in which he showed that he was at least equal, if not 
superior, to his great adversary. He, however, manfully and success- 
fully battled against the numerous obstacles which he met in his way. 
He was possessed of too much genius and firmness of nerve to be kept 
down and prevented from rising up, eagle-like, to the altitude where 
he could freely expand his wings and breathe in his native empyreal 
element. Conquering prejudices, calumnies, and envy, he grew 
rapidly, as he became better known and appreciated, upon the esteem 
and confidence of his fellow-citizens in his newly elected home, and 
was sent to represent Louisiana in the Senate of the United States. 



68 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

His career as such, as Secretary of State under the Presidency of 
General Jackson, and as Minister Plenipotentiary in France, is well 
known. For the present I have only to deal Avith him as a mem- 
ber of the New Orleans bar, where he towered up as one of its 
giants. 

Edward Livingston was tall and spare in body, and with strong, 
clear-cut features, which denoted his Scotch ancestry. The habitual 
expression of his face was meditative and rather austere, but his smile 
was indicative of the benignity of his heart. He Avas mild in manner, 
courteous, dignified, and indefatigably laborious. The pleasures of 
society did not seem to have much attraction for him. To change 
the nature of his occupation Avas sufficient relief and rest for his tem- 
perament, and even a diversion much more to his taste than any other. 
He was a profound jurist and an accomplished scholar. Which of the 
tAvo predominated, it would have been difficult to tell. He managed 
his cases in court with admirable self-possession. It Avas the calm con- 
sciousness of strength ; it was the serene majesty of intellect. There 
Avas no sparring, no wrangling, no broAA'beating. When he rose to 
speak, the attention of the judge, jurors, members of the bar, and 
everybody in court was instantly riveted. All knew that they Avere 
to listen to what Avas worth hearing. There Avere no flashy declama- 
tions, no unbecoming carpings, no hair-splitting, no indecorous clap- 
trap, no tinsel ornament, no stage thunder, no flimsy sophistical 
argumentation, no idle straggling Avords. His discourse Avas compact 
and robust; his language Avas terse and pure. His eloquence was 
of the classical order, and uniformly elegant. It would, in forensic 
debates, Aoav at first with the modesty of a gentle stream, but by 
degrees, swelling and rushing like the mighty tide of the ocean, it 
Avould overflow far and Avide, and leave to opposition not an inch of 
ground to stand upon. 

Moreau Lislet, his associate in the case which Ave have supposed 
ready for trial, is a rotund Frenchman past the meridian of life. His 
eyes" sparkle Avith good-natured wit under the large spectacles which 
bestride his small nose. Everything seems soft in him, even his bones. 
His flesh is tremulous, like blancmange or a jelly, and as yielding under 
the touch. His hands are diminutive and plump. He does not look 
formidable, does he ? No. Well, you had better beAvare of him. He 
is an artesian Avell of legal lore — deep, very deep. He is one of those 
tAvo or three jurists Avho Avere intrusted by the Legislature Avith the 
Avork of adapting the Napoleon Code to the Avants and circumstances 
of Louisiana under her neAV institutions. He has no pretensions to 
oratory. He addresses the court or the jury in a sort of conversa- 
tional, familiar Avay. He is always in a good humor, Avhich is com- 



THE NEW ORLEANS BENCH AND BAR IN IS::,;. 69 

municative. He is a very great favorite with the judges, the clerks, 
the sheriffs, the jurors, the members of the bar — in fact, with every- 
body. He is so kind, so benevolent, so amiable in all his dealings and 
sayings ! His bonhomie is so captivating ! Of so sympathizing a 
nature is he that, for instance, he sometimes takes up his adversary's 
side of the question, admits that there is a good deal to say in his 
favor, and says it and shows it too. He will even go so far as to pre- 
sent it to the court in its very best aspect. But after having thus 
acted with such kindness and impartiality toward his opponent, he 
pathetically apologizes for destroying all his hopes and illusions, 
regrets that his claim is not founded on the law and evidence appli- 
cable to the case, demonstrates it beyond the shadow of a doubt, and 
finally exterminates the poor fellow with a sigh of compassion over 
his hard fate. Ho, ho ! beware of Moreau Lislet and of his bon- 
homie ! 

The case in which these four gentlemen were engaged was a jury 
one. It was in the latter part of June, and exceedingly hot. When 
Grymes, for the plaintiff, rose to address the jury in English, one of 
its members who did not understand a single word of that language, 
speaking in the name of such of his colleagues as were in the same 
predicament, begged the judge on that ground to allow them to leave 
their seats, and be permitted to inhale the fresh air under the arcades 
of the building in which the court held its session. This was gra- 
ciously permitted, and during one hour that Grymes spoke the Gallic 
portion of the jurors enjoyed their promenade and their cigars in the 
cool breeze that came from the river. "When Grymes had done, and 
Seghers, on the same side, rose in his turn, the voice of the sheriff 
was heard crying loudly, " Gentlemen of the jury who are outside, 
please come into court." They immediately filed in and gravely 
resumed their seats. Seghers had hardly said a few words in 
French when the Anglo-Saxon jurors, on their application for a 
similar favor, were also permitted to stretch their legs under the 
same arcades, and to pass their time as comfortably as they could. 
The repetition of this scene took place when Livingston and Moreau 
Lislet spoke alternately. This was of daily occurrence at that 
epoch. 

After a little while everybody became reconciled to what at first 
had been thought an intolerable inconvenience or annoyance. In the 
course of time the high-spirited and light-limbed Latin genet and the 
massive, slower-tempered Saxon horse, being both harnessed to the car 
of justice, learned to pull together, and contrived by some means or 
other to make its wheels work smoothly, notwithstanding the natural 
difficulties of the road. The qualifications to be a juror were then of 



70 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

a higher order than those which have been since required, and if the 
echoes which are wal'ted to me in my retreat from our courts of 
justice are faithful expressions of the public sentiment on the sub- 
ject, I must come to the conclusion that trials by jury sixty years 
ago, notwithstanding certain eccentricities from which they were 
not free, gave rise to fewer complaints than those of the present 
day. 



THE OAKS. 

THE OLD DUELLING-GROUNDS OF NEW ORLEANS.* 
BY JOHN AUGUSTIN. 

[John Augustin was born in New Orleans, February 11, 1838. His volume, 
War Flowers (1865), is a collection of poems that were written by him during his service 
in the Confederate Army. He held, at different times, the city editorship of nearly 
every newspaper of New Orleans. He died February 5, 1888.] 

Under the wide-spreading oaks of ancient Gaul the consecrated 
Druids with golden sickle cut the holy mistletoe that sanctified their 
foreheads in the stern celebration of their rites of blood. Happy was 
the victim offered in sacrifice ; for to die was to know, and to go for- 
ward knowing, in that eternity of progressive acquirements and bliss 
which ended in the perfection of knowledge, the sublime identification 
with nature on some ultimate star, radiant with omniscience and 
musical with the rhythmic pulsations of eternal peace. 

I cannot sit of a calm evening under the pensive oaks, from whose 
gray beards, waving under the sway of the breeze, comes a murmur 
as of a prayer and prophecy, without reverting to that stern yet hope- 
ful creed of Runic times, which held knowledge to be the supreme 
good, and pointed to sacrificial death as the first step to its acquire- 
ment. 

It is curious that rites of blood should have been the foundation of 
every religion. Even the meek and divine Jesus found it necessary to 
die on the cross so that humanity might be saved. There is a prob- 
lem full of yet unfathomed meaning in this perpetual theory of blood 
atonement. Else why the traditional sanctity of war and the undying 
fame which attaches to successful military chieftains, loftier than the 
apotheosis of saints ? Why the glamour around the heroes of knight 
errantry, riding alone and full-armed in search of blood to spill for the 
redressing of wrong % "Why the trial by single combat, introduced by 
Holy Church and but recently fallen into disfavor ? 

Where the M etairie Ridge, slightly undulating, barely breaks the 
monotonous flatness of the hazy landscape, standing near the dilapi- 
dated tomb of Louis Allard, such thoughts crossed the mind of the 

* [Written in 1887.] 



72 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

writer as he gradually became enveloped in the dark shadows which the 
rays of the setting sun slanted from the oaks of the Lower City Park. 

These oaks were formerly known as the " Chenes d'Allard," other- 
wise called " M etairie oaks. 1 '' These, also, in their time, witnessed rites 
of blood, and lent their protecting shade to many a preconcerted, 
solemn and deadly encounter between man and man. 

A short walk from the terminus of the Bayou Road street-car line 
in New Orleans, at the foot of Esplanade Street, after crossing the 
bridge over Bayou St. John, brings the visitor in front of a magnifi- 
cent little forest of gigantic live oaks. It is the Lower City Park, in 
former days a wooded plantation belonging to Louis Allard. 

This gentleman, who was a man of letters and a poet, owned all 
that tract of land extending from Bayou St. John to the Orleans 
Canal, and from the Metairie Road to the old toll-gate. That portion 
of it which is now called the Lower City Park was purchased previous 
to his death by the millionnaire philanthropist, John McDonogh, at 
a sale made for foreclosure of mortgage by the Citizens' Bank of 
Louisiana. McDonogh left it by will to the cities of New Orleans 
and Baltimore, and the city of New Orleans acquired it in full owner- 
ship at the partition sale. 

During the latter portion of his life, Allard, who, being a poet, was 
an indifferent business man, crippled in health and fortune, was per- 
mitted, after the sale, by special agreement, to continue his occupation 
of the place. There he would spend all his days, reclining in an arm- 
chair under his beloved oaks, reading his favorite authors and dream- 
ing of what might have been. He died not long after the sale of his 
property, and in compliance with his dying wish lies buried in the old 
place under the very oak where the last years of his life had been 
spent. 

A few bricks, uncared for, a tomb burst open by time and ruthless 
hands, protected from the sun and rain by the faithful boughs of his 
favorite oak, mark his resting-place. 

To one coming from the Metairie Road, this tomb is on a wooded 
plain in the rear, well to the right of the park proper, from which it 
is divided by a small, swampy ravine, crossed by a primitive wooden 
bridge. From its site, glancing obliquely to the left, the legendary 
oaks rear their majestic heads in solemn grandeur. 

Scarcely half a century has passed over these centenarians since 
Louis Allard, in the full vigor of youth, walked under their branches. 
Allard is dead. McDonogh, who purchased from him, is also gone, 
leaving behind him, as undying monuments, the public schools with 
which he has gifted the city. A terrible war between two sections of 
our great country has changed and revolutionized the entire social sys- 



THE OAKS. 73 

tein of the South. But the grand oaks are still the same, solemnly 
brooding at night over memories of the past, Perhaps their gnarled 
trunks are somewhat more rugged ; but they are as majestic and vigor- 
ous as ever, their green boughs throwing back the sunlight with all 
the brightness and elasticity of everlasting youth. 

But the fame of the Metairie oaks does not rest upon the poetry or 
scholarly accomplishments of their former proprietor, nor upon the 
memory of the philanthropist who bequeathed them to the city, nor 
upon the sturdy strength or the perennial youth of their green 
branches ; the great interest that lingers among them comes from the 
memories which they recall, and it is the witchery of tradition that 
makes them immortal. 

The antithetic lights and shades of their leafy arcades, typical of 
a state of society where tragedy and gayety walked side by side in 
chivalrous converse, take back our memories to a period scarcely fifty 
years remote, when it was an e very-day occurrence to see under these 
very branches a meeting of adversaries in mortal combat, with rapier 
or pistol, sabre or shotgun. 

At that time New Orleans, though even then to a degree cosmo- 
politan, was essentially a Creole city, and under the full influence of 
the traditions which governed that high-strung and chivalrous race. 
The descendants of the early possessors of the soil, many of whom 
were of aristocratic blood, had grown up with the more plebeian sons 
of the other settlers, and, what with education in common, received in 
Europe or at the College d'Orleans in this city, what with intermar- 
riages, the habit of command acquired from the ownership of slaves, 
and the refining influence of well-employed leisure, formed a sort of 
aristocracy from which the South derived some of its brightest intel- 
lects. It was a nobility less of birth than of manners, breeding, edu- 
cation, and tradition. 

Besides, life was easy in New Orleans at that time, for the city was 
not only a great place of import and export from its position near the 
Gulf, but owing to its river facilities, not yet antagonized by the rail- 
roads, it controlled with scarcely anv competition the whole trade of 
the West. 

Money was therefore acquired without the absorbing and deleteri- 
ous consequences of incessant labor ; there was time left to merchants 
and clerks for mental culture, and imagination was not, by the nature 
of things, excluded from the active world. 

The women, bred at home, under a mother's jealous surveillance, 
educated by the best private teachers or at the renowned Convent of 
the Ursuline Nuns, were versed in arts and letters. Invariably treated 
with the most deferential gallantry by the men, none of whom were 



74 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

ever known to smoke or otherwise demean themselves in the presence 
of a lady, they had naturally acquired manners of great refinement 
and distinction. 

The world and society were therefore of courtly brilliancy. Mer- 
chants and lawyers were incidentally poets and wits, and the ladies 
acci tmplished musicians. 

( )ver all this : over men and women, there ruled a supreme sense 
of dignity and honor, maintained by the strictest and most unflinching 
public opinion. 

At that time bankrupts committed suicide, and women fallen from 
virtue disappeared and were never heard from. There was no compro- 
mise with honor ; society did not permit it. 

Under this moral condition of affairs, the punctilio among men was 
strict even to exaggeration. The least breach of etiquette, the most 
venial sin against politeness, the least suspicion thrown out of unfair 
dealing, even a bit of awkwardness, were causes sufficient for a cartel, 
which none dared refuse. 

The acceptance, however, did not mean that the quarrel must inevi- 
tably be settled on the field. The seconds, two on each side, discussed 
the quarrel dispassionately, sometimes with the assistance of mutual 
friends, and often arrived at an amicable and honorable settlement. 

A blow was strictly forbidden, and sufficient to debar the striker 
from the privilege of the duello. A gentleman who would so far for- 
get himself as to strike another, was exposed to the ignominy of being 
refused a meeting. Some who have so lost their self-possession have 
been known to submit to the greatest humiliation in order to obtain 
from their adversary an exchange of shots or a crossing of swords. 
Nor even was an insult permitted to go beyond a certain decorum of 
form. Experienced friends, well versed in the law and precedents of 
the code, settled beforehand every nice point, so that the adversaries 
met under the oaks in full equality, morally and socially. 

How many a bloody combat originated in a ballroom, where the 
cause of the difficulty passed unnoticed by all ! 

Said a gentleman to a much-courted lady dancing in a brilliant 
ballroom : 

" Honor me with half of this dance ? " 

" Ask monsieur," answered the lady ; " it belongs to him." 

" Never," spoke the dancer, when appealed to, whirling past in 
the waltz, and just caught the words softly spoken by smiling lips as 
he passed by : 

" Ah, vous etes mal eleve." 

Not a word more was said that night between the two gentlemen, 
though they subsequently met and bowed ; but early the next morning 



THE OAKS. «5 

the flippant talker received a challenge, and in the evening a neat 
coup droit under the oaks at the Metairie. 

So well recognized was the code by all who had any pretensions to 
good breeding, that even judges on the bench would resent an insult 
from lawyers at the bar. A typical anecdote of the time is here given 
as exemplifying the then existing feeling about the duello. 

Judge Joachim Bermudez, father of the present * Chief Justice of 
the State, while on the bench, made a ruling against a certain lawyer, 
who objected in rather unbecoming terms. He was ordered to sit 
down, and refused ; whereupon the judge ordered the sheriff to take 
him into custody for contempt of court. Drawing a pistol, the lawyer 
defied the sheriff, who feared to advance. The judge, leaping from his 
bench, seized the lawyer by the arm and handed him to a police 
officer, who led him to prison. 

The judge soon after ordered his release. 

That evening he received a challenge from the lawyer, which was 
promptly accepted. On the field the lawyer offered to apologize ; but 
that was not permitted by the code. Never, on the field. The judge 
absolutely refused any apology, and the lawyer had to leave the country. 
He could not have practised, after this, before the courts of the State. 

The oaks of the Metairie, or " Chenes d'Allard," did not become a 
place of rendezvous for duellists until the year 183-1. Previous to this 
the favorite place for fighting was the Fortin property, now the Fair 
Grounds. The fact is, New Orleans being then but sparsely built in 
the rear, there were a number of convenient places closer at hand 
where those who had a stomach for battle could satisfy their cravings 
to their heart's content, without fear of interference. To say the 
truth, interference was the exception. It is true that there existed a 
law against duelling, but the practice was so strongly welded in the 
customs of the people that the statute served only to add the glamour 
of mystery and the flavor of forbidden fruit to the other fascinations 
of the deadly game, and might as well not have existed. 

Things being so, it is not astonishing that New Orleans should 
have been a favorite resort for professors of fence or maitres (Pannes. 
Most of these, having no further personal value than their skill with 
the foils, lived in blood, wine, and profligacy their circumscribed lives, 
between the cafes and salles d'escrime, and even their names are now 
forever forgotten. Others, who pursued their calling as an honored 
profession, acquired a certain standing in society, and old residents 
love to talk over their skill in arms and their other lovable and manly 
traits. Others, again, have acquired fame for having killed or having 
been killed in duels. 

* [1887.] 



16 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

Among the latter were Marcel Dauphin, who was killed by A. Nora 
in a duel with shotguns ; Bonneval, who was killed by Keynard, also 
a professional swordsman ; L'Alouette, who killed Shubra, another 
professor, and who was Pepe Bulla's teacher of fence and subsequently 
his associate ; Thimecourt, who killed Poulaga, and of whom more 
hereafter, as also about his confrere Monthiach ; and more of the same 
sort. 

Among the former were E. Baudoin, a Parisian, who was very 
popular and well esteemed ; Emile Cazere, who had quite an aristo- 
cratic clientele; and Gilbert Rosiere, familiarly called by his pupils 
Titi Rosiere, perhaps the most popular among all the fencing-masters 
that ever came to New Orleans. I must not forget Basile Croqucre, 
who, though a mulatto, was such a fine blade that many of the best 
Creole gentlemen did not hesitate, notwithstanding the strong preju- 
dice against color, to frequent his salle (V amies, and even cross swords 
with him in private asmuU. 

Gilbert Rosiere, whose son Gustave, himself an admirable swords- 
man, followed the Gardes d' Orleans to the plain of Shiloh at General 
Beauregard's call, is the maitre cVarmes who has left the best and cer- 
tainly the most vivid souvenirs. All of us who were young before the 
war, remember the gay, whole-souled, though irascible, fencing-master. 
A native of Bordeaux, he had come to New Orleans when a very young- 
man, to make his fortune at the bar. But he was of a wild disposition 
and fell in with a wild set : so he dropped the Code Napoleon for the 
Code of Honor, became a leader in all the escapades and devil-may- 
care adventures of thejeunesse doree of that time, and turned fencing- 
master. During the Mexican war he made a fortune (which he 
squandered as lightly as made) teaching fencing to officers. Brave 
and generous to a fault, he was every one's friend, and, contradic- 
tory as it may seem, this hero of seven duels in one week was, in 
some respects, of womanly tenderness. He would fight with men to 
the bitter death, but would not have hurt a defenceless thing, woman, 
child, or fly. 

He was passionately fond of music and nervously sensitive to its 
melting impressions. A great frequenter of the opera, his superb head 
could be seen almost every night towering above the others in the 
parquette. On one occasion, deeply touched by the pathos of a well- 
sung cantilena, he wept audibly. An imprudent neighbor laughed, 
but his amusement was of short duration, for Rosiere had scarcely 
noticed it than his tenderness turned to anger. 

" C'est vrai," he said, " je pleure, mais je donne aussi des calottes/' 

By this time the man's face was already slapped, and the next day 
a flesh wound had taught him that it is not always good to laugh. 



the oaks. :; 

Well might Rosiere have exclaimed with the old German knight at 
the close of his career : 

" I have lived my life, I have fought my fight, 
I have drunk my share of wine ; 
From Trier to Koln there never was knight 
Led a merrier life than mine ! " 

It was in the spring of 1840. There was a grand assaut d'armes 
between professors at the old " Salle St. Philipe," which was filled 
with the gilded youth of old-time New Orleans. None but brevetted 
experts, who could show a diploma, were allowed to participate. The 
valorous Pepe Lulla, now famous for a large number of successful 
duels, then a vigorous young man, skilled in the use of all weapons, 
was refused the privilege of a bout because he had no papers to show. 

An Italian professor of counterpoint, named Poulaga, a man of 
magnificent physique and herculean strength, was there holding his 
own with the broadsword, and bidding defiance to all comers. 

Captain Thimecourt, a former cavalry officer, opposed and defeated 
him. The humiliation was too much for the Italian's pride, and he 
remarked with a sneer that Thimecourt was a good "tireur de 
sailed 

" Quhi cela ne tievme" at once exclaimed the soldier, " let us adjourn 
to the field." 

Without further parley, they took rendezvous for the oaks, and 
there Thimecourt cut his adversary to pieces. 

This same assaut d'armes was the cause of Pepe Lulla's challenging 
a French professor named Grand Bernard, who had insisted upon his 
producing a diploma before crossing swords with him in the salle 
d'armes. They fought with broadswords, and Pepe with his good 
blade, though he had no diploma, opened the master's flank in two 
places. 

Thimecourt was one of the most noted professors of fence of the 
period, his favorite weapon being the broadsword, in the management 
of which he excelled. An admirable expounder of the counterpoint, 
he was not otherwise highly cultivated in any manner, and delighted 
principally in broils and battle. 

Another well-known and contemporaneous professor was a German 
swordsman named Monthiach. He was tall, fleshy, and muscular, and 
at the same time the best-natured fellow in the world, but of course 
always ready for a duel, particularly with a professor. Professors of 
all kinds have always been, more or less, jealous of each other, but the 
maitres d'armts of that period were peculiarly and aggressively so. 

Well, Thimecourt and Monthiach had some slight difference about 



78 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

a coup, and, naturally, as they disagreed completely, the only way to 
come to an understanding was to fight it out. 

They fought with broadswords, because it was about that weapon 
that they had disagreed. The duel was short, sharp, and decisive. 
At the first pass, Monthiach made a terribly vicious cut at his adver- 
sarv, evidently intended to cut off his head at one blow. The roup 
was admirably conceived and executed. 

Thimecourt, who had his own idea, did not parry with his sword, 
but dodged. His hat was cut clear in two, Monthiach's blade grazing 
his scalp. At the same time the Frenchman, passing under his adver- 
sary's sword, opened his breast with a splendid coup de pointe. The 
seconds interfered. The gash was a frightful one, and the blood flowed 
freely, yet the German professor insisted upon going on with the fight. 
The seconds, however, would not permit it. 

They had taken no surgeon with them, and Monthiach, to the 
horror of the bystanders, pulled out some tow which he had in his 
pocket, and packing his wound with it, to stop the flow of blood, 
walked home in a frenzy of anger, cursing at the seconds who had 
stopped the fight, for, as he said, it was a beautiful coup, and he would 
have assuredly chopped off Thimecourt's head if he had had a chance 
to renew it. Three days after he was on parade, marching, musket in 
hand, in the ranks of the " Fusiliers," a German militia company, then 
commanded by Captain Daniel Friedrich. 

There was not a day passed without one or two encounters at the 
oaks or elsewhere. The spirit of the age might have been expressed 
in Don Ca?sar de Bazan's terse saying in Victor's Hugo's Buy Bias .- 

" Quand je tiens un bon duel je ne le lache pas." 

Old citizens who lived in the neighborhood of the oaks say that 
for a time it was a daily procession of pilgrims to this bloody Mecca. 
Some of them walked or rode back, others were carried home for 
burial, but once on the field, honor required that some blood should be 
spilt. Sometimes it was a drop only, sometimes a draining of the 
veins. 

The following double anecdote is typical of the manners and cus- 
toms of the period : 

Mr. Hughes Pedesclaux was a tall, muscular, and athletic young- 
man, whole-souled and popular, but somewhat quick-tempered ; brave 
as all of his race, and skilled in the use of arms. 

Mr. Donatien Augustin was a tall, slim young lawyer, a great 
student, fond of his profession, but fond also of the military. Both 
were attached to the " Canonniers d' Orleans," a crack artillery com- 
pany of those days. Augustin had just been made a lieutenant, and 
was rather proud of his uniform and trailing artillery sabre. Parade 



THE OAKS. 79 

had just been dismissed ; Pedesclaux came up to his friend Augustin (a 
child whom he had bullied and spanked at the "College d'Orleans"), 
and jovially, but irreverently, gave a deprecatory kick to the swagger- 
ing weapon, saying : 

" What could you do with this thing ? " 

Quick as a flash came the retort : 

" Follow me a few paces to some quiet place, and I will show 
you ! " 

Not a word more was said ; each man picked up two friends to act 
as seconds, and forthwith, followed by the delighted crowd, eager for 
the sight of a scrimmage, marched to the scene of combat. 

In those days ISTew Orleans was not extensively built, and fighters 
not very particular about time or place. A convenient spot was soon 
reached, the adversaries doffed their uniforms, stripped to their shirt 
sleeves, and drew their weapons. The seconds, after placing them in 
position and enjoining each to do his duty as a gentleman, uttered the 
sacramental words, " Allez, messieurs" and to it they went with a will. 

Pedesclaux was in the full vigor of manhood and skilled in sword- 
play ; Augustin was a mere youth, with little experience in arms, but 
very active and willing. As luck would have it, after a few passes he 
cut his redoubtable adversary in the sword-arm. 

The seconds interfered ; there was a great shaking of hands, and 
the incident ended in a gay and plentiful dinner at Victor's on Tou- 
louse Street. 

Some time afterwards, Pedesclaux had a quarrel with a retired 
French cavalry officer, reputed as a duellist. The cartel was passed 
between the parties with due solemnity, and the Frenchman, having 
the choice of weapons, selected broadswords, on horseback. They 
fought on a plain in the rear of the second district, known as " La 
Plaine Paquette," on account of the peculiar game of ball which used 
to be played there. 

An eye-witness says : " It was a handsome sight. The adversaries 
were mounted on spirited horses and stripped to the waist. As they 
rode up to each other, nerved for the combat, their respective muscu- 
lar development and the confidence of their bearing gave promise of 
an interesting fight. The Frenchman was heavy and somewhat un- 
gainly, but his muscles looked like whip-cord, and his broad, hairy 
chest gave evidence of remarkable strength and endurance. Pedes- 
claux, somewhat lighter in weight, was admirably proportioned, and 
his youthful suppleness seemed to more than counterbalance his adver- 
sary's brawny but somewhat rigid manhood. 

" A clashing of the steel, which drew sparks from the blades, and 
the two adversaries crossed and passed each other by unhurt. In 



80 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

a moment, both horses had been vaulted to face each other by the 
expert riders, and the enemies met again. A terrible head blow from 
the Frenchman would now have cleft Pedesclaux to the shoulder- 
blade, if his quick sword had not warded off the death stroke. It 
was then that, with lightning rapidity, before his adversary could 
recover his guard, which had been disturbed by the momentum of his 
blow, the Creole, by a rapid half circle, regained his, and with a well- 
directed coup de pointe a droUe (having taken care to keep his adver- 
sary to the right) plunged his blade through the body of the French 
officer, who reeled in his saddle, fell, and was picked up senseless and 
bleeding by his friends. He died soon afterward." 

Another duel on horseback, which was much talked about at the 
time, was fought with cavalry sabres by Alexander Cuvillier and Lieu- 
tenant Schomberg of the United States Cavalry. They had a quar- 
rel, which terminated in a street fight, the result of which was that 
Cuvillier was wounded by Schomberg with a sword cane. 

As soon as he had sufficiently recovered from his injuries, Cuvillier 
sent Messrs. Eniile Lasere and Mandeville de Marigny with a cartel to 
Schomberg, who immediately accepted it, choosing broadswords, on 
horseback. They fought on D'Aquin Green, a little above Carrollton. 
After the second pass, Cuvillier made a vicious cut at his adversary, 
which, falling short, or being otherwise miscalculated, severed the 
jugular vein of Schomberg' s horse, that fell and died on the spot. 

This put a stop to the duel. 

Sometime afterward Alexander Cuvillier died, and his brother, 
Adolphe Cuvillier, who had charge of his succession, received a letter 
from Schomberg. This letter recalled the duel, saying that the horse 
which had been killed in the fight belonged to his Colonel, that it was 
worth five hundred dollars, which he had had to reimburse, and hint- 
ing that it would certainly be proper for Mr. Cuvillier to pay him 
back at least half that amount. Mr. Adolphe Cuvillier wrote back, 
saying that his brother was dead, and that he had accepted the suc- 
cession, and had charge of all his brother's business, this quarrel, of 
course, included ; that he would cheerfully send a check for two hun- 
dred and fifty dollars, as testamentary executor of his brother, and as 
such, would also be exceedingly willing to pay full price for another 
horse if the lieutenant agreed to renew the fight with him. He never 
received any answer. 

It would seem that Donatien Augustin, who was later in his life 
judge of one of the district courts, General of the Louisiana Legion, 
and one of the most highly esteemed and conservative of our citizens, 
was lucky in the few duels in which the temper of the period caused 
him to be eng-acred. Two of his adversaries each killed his man in 



TEE OAKS. 81 

subsequent encounters : Pedesclaux, as above stated, and Saintmanat, 
with whom he harmlessly exchanged one or two pistol shots in a 
slight quarrel, who afterward killed Azenor Bosque in a duel, also 
with pistols, and subsequently, with similar weapons, grievously 
wounded Commodore Riebaud. 

The following affair, which he had with Alexander Grailhe, is told 
here on account of the interest connected with Grailhe's luck in a 
subsequent encounter. The cause of the quarrel is at this day of small 
concern. Suffice it to say that after the insult, or rather provocation, 
had passed (for in those days gentlemen rarely insulted), and each was 
sure that a deadly meeting was to follow, the two gentlemen travelled 
together in a carriage with ladies, who wondered, after the duel, at 
their mutual affability during the whole trip. 

They met with colichemardes at the oaks. Grailhe, highly bred, 
and under, as he deemed, grievous provocation, as soon as the weap- 
ons had been crossed, and the impressive AUez, messieurs, had been 
pronounced, lost his temper and furiously charged his antagonist. 
Augustin, cool, collected, and agile, parried and evaded each savage 
thrust, till finally, by a temps d'a/rret, judiciously interpolated into a 
terrific lunge of Grailhe, pierced him through and through the chest. 

One of the lungs had been perforated. Grailhe remained for a 
long time between life and death, and at last came out of his room, 
but bent forward like an old man. The physicians despaired of his 
life, for an internal abscess, which could scarcely be reached, had 
formed ; and it was now for the wounded man only a question of 
time and chance. The latter divinity came to his rescue in a most 
remarkable and original manner. 

He quarrelled with Colonel Mandeville de Marigny, and they met 
at the oaks. The weapons were pistols at fifteen paces, two shots 
each, advance five paces, and fire at will. Grailhe advanced three or 
four steps, Marigny remaining perfectly still, and both fired simulta- 
neously. Grailhe fell, pierced through the body, exactly in the place 
of his former and vet unhealed wound, the ball lodging directly 
against the spinal column. Marigny, pistol in hand, advanced, cool 
as a piece of marble, to the utmost limit marked out, when Grailhe, 
who was suffering dire pain, exclaimed : 

"Achtctz moi .' " 

Marigny lifted his pistol high above his head, and firing into the 
air, said : 

" I never strike a fallen enemy ! " 

Grailhe was carried home more of a corpse than a living being ; 
but, sooth to say. the ball had pierced the smouldering abscess that 
threatened his life, had opened an exit for its poisonous accumula- 
6 



82 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

tions, and the wounded man, some time afterward, walked out of 
his room as erect and stately as ever. Thus for once did the mes- 
senger of death bring life and health. 

Poor Frank Yates was less fortunate in his affair with Joe 
Chandler, some time in 1859. A lie, reported by an injudicious friend, 
brought a cartel, and it was agreed that the young men should light 
with duelling pistols at ten paces. The fight was to take place in the 
afternoon, under the oaks at the Metairie ; but the duellists were 
interfered with there by the police, so they repaired to a place far- 
ther on, near Bayou St. John, Avhence they were again driven away 
by the officers of the law. It was now getting late ; a drizzling rain 
had set in, and it was urgent to bring matters to an issue before 
night ; so principals and seconds jumped out of their carriages at a 
place somewhere at the foot of Bienville Street, where preparations 
were promptly made for the fight and the principals placed in position. 

Night was coming on apace, and the drizzling rain added to the 
gloomy and desolate appearance of the surroundings. The pistols 
were loaded, handed to the principals, and the command given to fire. 
Two shots were exchanged with no effect, and an attempt was made 
by Chandler's seconds to settle the matter ; but this was resisted by 
the opposite side, and a third shot became necessary. Both fired at 
the same time, and Frank Yates fell. Chandler's ball had struck him 
in the side, ranging upward through the bowels. He died a few days 
afterward. 

The population of New Orleans has always been fond of music, 
and particularly of the opera, which in its palmy days it lavishly 
sustained. The Creoles, extreme in all things, carried this taste to 
the limits of passion. Many a deadly duel grew out of simple dis- 
cussions over the merits of individual singers. It would take a vol- 
ume to recite the various quarrels that were engendered by the opera. 
Journalistic critics, of course, who published their opinions, had to 
bear the brunt and be ever ready to back an article with steel or lead. 

Many still living, and even who would not like to be called old, 
remember two delightful artistes who flourished here during the 
season of 1857-58, under Mr. Boudousquie's administration ; namely, 
Mile. Bourgeois, a contralto of great dramatic talent, and Mme. 
Colson, one of the wittiest and most fascinating of light soprani. It 
must be added that Mme. Colson had replaced as chanteuse Ugere a 
Mme. Preti-Baille, who was a very pretty woman, a singer of great 
technical accomplishments, but cold as an icicle, and therefore not 
popular with the general public. She was a great friend of Mile. 
Bourgeois. It is useless to add that there was no love lost between 
Mme. Colson and the contralto. 



THE OAKS. 83 

This Mile. Bourgeois made it a point to show, on the occasion of 
her benefit night, for which she had chosen Victor Masse" s opera of 
Galathee, when, instead of asking Mme. Colson, in whose reper- 
toire the title role undoubtedly was, she went outside of the company, 
and asked Mme. Preti-Baille, who was then in the city giving music 
lessons, to sing the part. The announcement created great feeling 
among opera-goers, and was warmly discussed in the clubs. Mme. 
Colson was very much liked and admired, and her partisans, feeling- 
outraged at the insult, as they deemed, thus put upon her, swore that 
Preti-Baille would not be permitted to sing. The friends of Bourgeois 
swore on their side that it was not, after all, the woman's fault, and 
that those who hissed her would rue it. That threat was sufficient in 
those days to create an army of hissers. 

The matter, as before stated, was largely discussed at the clubs, on 
the streets, and at the salle cVarmes. In one of the latter places 
Emile Bozonier and Gaston de Coppens, two of the most popular 
young fellows of the day, were with a number of others practising 
with foils, or lounging. Of course Bourgeois' benefit night was the 
topic of conversation. Some said that Preti-Baille should be hissed, 
others that it would be a shame. Bozonier said nothing (it is probable 
that he did not care much one way or the other). Suddenly Coppens, 
turning to him, said : 

" What do you say about this, Bozonier % " 

" I," was the deliberate answer, " think that a man who goes to the 
theatre for the purpose of hissing a woman is a blackguard and should 
have his face slapped ! " 

Coppens grew pale. 

" Do you know," he retorted, " that I have proclaimed myself one 
of those who will hiss that woman down ? " 

" No," Bozonier replied, " but I nevertheless mean what I said." 

" Would you slap a man's face who hisses on that occasion \ " 

" If he is close enough to me, I assuredly will," answered Bozonier, 
now thoroughly aroused and interested. 

" Well, you will have your hands full," said Coppens, and the mat- 
ter was dropped. 

And so the benefit night came on. The opera house on Orleans 
Street was crowded to suffocation, and it was evident, from the excited 
and determined looks of the young men present, that a fire was smoul- 
dering all through that audience. Mile. Bourgeois was the Pygmalion, 
and nothing special happened until the curtain covering the statue was 
drawn aside and Galathee began to live and move. 

Then there arose such an antagonistic cacophony of hisses from 
one side, and applause from the other, as has rarely been heard in an 



84 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

opera house. Cold as marble and all as white, but apparently unmoved, 
the singer, amid the growing tumult, which never ceased till the curtain 
fell, sang all her numbers undaunted, braver than any hero who ever 
repelled an assault or led a charge. And so on all along, also, during 
the second act and until the final drop of the curtain. 

Little, indeed, did anybody that evening hear of Masse's music, 
most of the ladies, of course, having deserted long before the end. In 
that encounter of hisses and plaudits several quarrels were picked up 
by the } r oung bloods, which ended at the oaks or elsewhere, but we 
are now preoccupied w r ith only one. 

Coppens had hissed, and Bozonier had seen him, but they were 
separated by a dense crowd ; only their eyes met and a sign of defi- 
ance was passed. A day or so afterward, Bozonier met Coppens, who 
crossed over the street to him, smiling under a sneer, and accosted 
him with : 

" Well, Bozonier, what about those slaps ? " 

Bozonier was of herculean strength, and his answ r er was a buffet 
which sent Coppens sprawling in the street. Quick as lightning, and 
agile as a cat, Coppens got up and grasped for his weapons, but Bozo- 
nier was too powerful for him, and soon had placed it out of his power 
to use either knife or pistol. A few days afterwards, Bozonier had 
received a challenge, and being skilled neither in the use of rapier 
nor pistol, chose cavalry sabres. 

They fought at the oaks, within pistol shot of Allard's tomb. 

Bozonier was a trifle above the middle height, but remarkably 
active and muscular. Coppens was small in stature, but wiry and of 
feline activity. Both were dandies in dress and lions in courage. 

In a twinkling the coats were on the grass. The principals were 
placed in position, and the usual recommendations made by the sec- 
onds, comprising the instructions that the fight was to last till one of 
the adversaries should be completely disabled. 

The first pass was terrible ; Bozonier engaged Coppens in tierce, 
made a feint, then taking advantage of the movement of his adversary 
to parry, rapidly passed over his sword and made a swinging stroke 
at him, which would inevitably have severed his head from his body, 
had not Coppens, by a timely movement, warded off partly the effect 
of the blow. But there was vigor to spare in the cut, for Coppens 
fell, the blood spurting like water from a terrible gash on the cheek 
and a severe cut in the chest. 

It was lucky for him at that moment that Bozonier's generous soul 
prevented him following up his advantage, for he had his foe at his 
mercy. He paused till Coppens rose. This rise was the spring of a 
wounded tiger; a furious coup depomte penetrated Bozonier's sword- 



THE OAKS. 85 

arm above the elbow, cutting the muscles and disabling him. Then 
Coppens had it all his own way, though his plucky adversary did his 
best, handicapped as he was by his now almost useless arm, which 
could scarcely hold the weapon. The seconds did not see his terrible 
position in time, neither could his furious foe appreciate it, and before 
the former could interfere, Bozonier had received two deep cuts in the 
chest, a terrible slash in the left arm, and a fearful coup de polnte in 
the side. He was bleeding at every pore. 

Happily for his many friends, his strong constitution saved him, 
and he lives yet, though four years of war, superadded to this fearful 
hashing, have left but a comparative wreck from his once splendid 
physique. 

Coppens, who was afterward colonel of the Louisiana Zouaves, 
died like a soldier at the battle of Seven Pines, flag in hand, forty 
yards in front of his command, while gallantly leading a Florida 
regiment, after his own had been cut to pieces. 

At the period referred to, the opera season lasted six months, and 
such was the inclination of our people for this kind of music that the 
interest remained unabated to the end. So a month or so after the 
duel just narrated, a violent critique from the pen of Emile Hiriart, 
who was writing for the True Delta, appeared in the columns of that 
sheet. Hiriart, who was a very trenchant writer, had smote, as it 
seems, right and left, and spared no one. 

The very same day he received two challenges — one from Mr. 
Placide Canonge, now the highly polished art and musical critic of 
the New Orleans Bee, and one from Mr. E. Locquet, both of whom 
had taken exceptions to the article. He accepted both. 

Mr. Canonge's challenge having priority, he was first attended to. 
They fought with pistols at ten yards, and exchanged three shots, 
each shot of Hiriart's cutting Mr. Canonge's clothes, and that gentle- 
man receiving those leaden warnings with the utmost composure and 
the sweetest of smiles. Their seconds thereupon withdrew them, and 
the matter between them was settled. 

A few days after, Hiriart was out again with his faithful seconds, 
this time to answer Locquet's challenge. 

There was more underlying this meeting than the conventional 
chivalry of the " point of honor." There was hate between the two, 
and a deadly purpose, as was evidenced by the choice of weapon- 
double-barrelled shotguns loaded with ball, distance forty paces. In 
the hands of Creole gentlemen, who were all practised hunters, this 
weapon was the deadliest. It was rare that both parties survived an 
encounter of this kind. Often the two adversaries were killed, and 
almost invariably one was carried away from the field a corpse. 



86 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

Seconds rarely permitted the use of the shotgun, unless under the 
gravest provocation. 

The preliminaries of a duel are always solemn, but here an atmos- 
phere of awe pervaded the scene, as, in silence, the ground was meas- 
ured, the principals placed in position, the weapons loaded and handed 
to them by their seconds. Both were calm and apparently unmoved ; 
but the set chin, the firm lip, the eye coldly gleaming, told of deadly 
passion and intent. 

Hiriart' s friends had tossed, as is customary, for the word of com- 
mand, and won it. In a close contest like this one — for both were 
excellent shots and men of recognized nerve — this was considered a 
great advantage. 

The word was given : " Fire ! one, two, three ! " 

Hiriart fired between the command and " one " ; Locquet at the 
word " one," but it was not a second's difference. 

Locquet turned completely around, leaped in the air, and fell flat 
on his face, without a word or cry. 

Hiriart made a half pivot, exclaimed " I am done for," and fell on 
his hands apparently lifeless. 

The mutual friends and surgeons rushed to their principals. Loc- 
quet was dead. The ball had penetrated the brain. 

Hiriart's life had been saved, it appears, by his quick firing, which 
did not allow his adversary time enough to raise his weapon to a suffi- 
cient elevation, for his shot was dead in line. The ball had ploughed the 
ground within about fifteen feet of Hiriart, then glanced up and struck 
him in the stomach. A welt of the size of a duck's egg was disclosed 
on his body, black and protruding, while the skin was but slightly 
abrased ; the ball was found in the lining of his coat. He recovered 
after a few days' seclusion. 

Several memorable duels with shotguns are chronicled with letters 
of blood, among which are the unfortunate affair in which John de 
Buys killed young Castaing ; the one in which Alpuente, fighting also 
with De Buys, was saved from death by a twenty -dollar gold piece 
which he had forgotten in his vest pocket, and which arrested the 
too true course of the ball ; the duel in which Nora killed Dauphin ; 
the affair between Arthur Guillotte and Piseros, in which the latter 
had a lung perforated and was disabled ; the fatal meeting between 
George White and Packenham Le Blanc, in which Le Blanc was killed 
outright ; the meeting in which General Sewell killed Thomas Cane, 
and other fatal affairs. 

A duel which, at the time, created quite a sensation, was the affair 
between John de Buys and Aristide Gerard, in which the former 
received fourteen wounds at Gerard's hands. They fought with 



THE OAKS. 87 

colichemardes. De Buys, though the best, of fellows, was fearfully 
quick-tempered and had fought some twenty-four duels, with more or 
less success, three or four of which with his mortal foe, Octave Le Blanc. 
The quarrel with Gerard happened at Belanger's Billiard Hall, at the 
corner of Orleans and Koyal Streets. 

A fatal duel with colichemardes was that in which Amaron Ledoux 
killed a Frenchman named De Chevremont. 

It would be possible to go on thus indefinitely, but, for the purposes 
of this writing, the cases cited are more than sufficient. 

Whatever modernists may say, with great reason, against the 
duello, for it led to many deplorable abuses, there was more in the 
institution than a mere agreement to fight, or even than in that relic 
of mediaeval barbarism, the "trial by combat." It was in many 
instances an impediment to bloodshed. Friends quarrelled in moment- 
ary excitement, and instead of seeking personal explanation, which, in 
high-strung people, is impossible under provocation, intrusted mutual 
friends with the demand of satisfaction. If the seconds were wise, 
calm explanation would follow, and the trifle was adjusted. The duties 
of the seconds were of paramount importance, for they assumed every 
responsibility, and were made answerable for the life or honor of the 
principals at the bar of public opinion. 

The duello, however, had a refining influence, for every gentleman 
was forced to be guarded in his language and behavior, as he well 
knew that bare brutal courage was not sufficient to carry him trium- 
phantly through. It is true that a gentleman was obliged to fight, 
but he had to fight well— that is, for reason, and under plausible and 
legitimate conditions, stanch enough to hold the current of public 
opinion. Otherwise he was quickly ostracised, and society sustained 
all who refused to cross swords or exchange shots with him. The code 
was very strict. You could not fight a man whom you could not ask 
to your house. 

This is not an apology of the duello, which is now out of fashion 
and even become absurd, if it were only by reason of the almost total 
indifference of public opinion in its regard. It does not much matter 
nowadays if a man fights or not. 

We have other ways of proving ourselves gentlemen. 

The purpose here is only to recall a brilliant, though not altogether 
faultless epoch of Louisiana history, to show what reason our fathers 
had in their madness, and point out the lessons that may be profitably 
gathered by discriminating minds under the leafy shades of the oaks. 



THE FAILURE OF THE CONFEDERATE GOVERNMENT 
IN ITS DIPLOMACY WITH FOREIGN NATIONS, 
ESPECIALLY WITH ENGLAND AND FRANCE. 

[From The Military Operations of General Beauregard. Copyright, 1883, by 
Harper & Brothers.] 

BY ALFRED ROMAN. 

[Alfred Roman, second son of Governor Andre Bienvenu Roman, was born in 
St. James Parish, La., in 1824. In youth he studied at Jefferson College. At the age 
of twenty-one he was admitted to the Louisiana bar. He served with honor in the 
Confederate Army (1861-65). In 1880 Governor Wiltz appointed him Judge of the 
Criminal Court of New Orleans, Section A, for a term of eight years. Of his well-known 
work, The Military Operations of General Beauregard. (1883), Charles Gayarre says : 
"Henceforth, of our Civil War it will be impossible to write the history without taking 
this valuable contribution into the most serious consideration." Judge Roman died, 
September 20, 1892.] 

The diplomacy of the Confederate administration consisted of 
arguments as to rights, and appeals to precedent. The arguments set 
forth the origin, construction, and federal character of the government 
of the United States under its Constitution, supplemented by the right 
claimed by all free people, under the Declaration of Independence, to 
alter or abolish their forms of government, and to institute such new 
governments " as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety 
and happiness." These were expected to justify the secession of the 
Southern States, and the formation of the new republican government 
< >f the Confederate States. On this presentation of the case appeals 
were made to the monarchical governments of Europe — not at all in 
love with republicanism — to recognize the independence of the Con- 
federate States, at whatever cost, as a matter of moral sentiment. It 
was further insisted, with confidence, that " cotton is king," and that 
the nations of Europe were dependent on the South, with its annual 
crops of cotton. England, especially, with her eight millions of fact* >rv 
hands, could not afford to have our ports closed, and must, of neces- 
sity, recognize our separate existence and raise the blockade. At the 
same time it was persistently sought to keep the Confederate States 
commercially independent of all the nations of Europe, and to confer 
no advantages in trade. The fact seems to have been whollv lost 
sight of by the administration, that England had large interests in the 
cotton culture of her East Indian Empire ; that the ruin of the Con- 




Al.l'RED ROMAN. 



THE DIPLOMACY OF THE CONFEDERATE GOVERNMENT. 89 

federate States and the depression of rival cotton production would 
stimulate and promote British independence of American cotton ; and 
that, unless compensatory and overbalancing interests in trade were 
tendered, England might seek commercial freedom by non-interven- 
tion. 

The efforts of the Northern States to preserve the Union were not 
inspired by love of the Southern people. The value of the Union to 
them was in the great interests developed through the powers of the 
general government, exercised by the Northern majority and involv- 
ing Northern prosperity. The war was waged against the South by 
the North to retain the enormous benefits derivable through discrim- 
inating and prohibitory tariffs, exclusive navigation laws, and unequal 
and profligate appropriations from the common treasury. 

The people of the South had long struggled for ad valorem duties 
laid for revenue, and against duties discriminating for the benefit of 
classes at the North. In 1833 the Union was nearly dissolved on the 
ground of the unconstitutionality, inequality, and oppression of such 
taxes. And, in framing the Confederate constitution, it was carefully 
provided that " no duties or taxes on importations from foreign nations 
shall be laid to promote or foster any branch of industry ; and all 
duties, imports, and excises shall be uniform throughout the Con- 
federate States." 

It should be remembered that, during eighteen months, the question 
of African slavery was no obstacle to foreign relations. The United 
States government had declared, in despatches sent to its ambassadors 
abroad, that the war was made to save the Union only, and to main- 
tain all the rights and institutions of the States unchanged. The United 
States Congress announced to the Confederate States and to the world 
the same policy. Thus did the United States government stand before 
the foreign powers, no less than before the South, as the supporter of 
African slavery, until September 22d, 1862. Then, as a war measure 
to cripple the South and assist the North in keeping the seceded 
States in the Union, President Lincoln issued his Proclamation of 
Emancipation. When this was done the time for the Confederate 
States to establish friendly relations with foreign nations had passed. 

The fact should not be overlooked that the great Conservative 
party of England — which, to a considerable extent, represented the 
land-holding and agricultural interests of the country, formerly led by 
the Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel, and latterly by the Earl 
of Derby and Mr. Disraeli — sympathized deeply with the conservative 
attitude of the people of the Confederate States. Although not in 
power during the war, the Tory party was strong and vigorous. It 
retired from control of the government, Lord Derby and Mr. Disraeli 



90 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

resigning in June, 1859, on account of the question between Austria 
and Italy, and it came into office again, succeeding the Palmerston- 
Russell administration, in June, 1866. The parties were nearly bal- 
anced, and any blunder on the part of one placed the other in almost 
immediate power. 

Soon after the government was organized the Confederate Congress 
unanimously voted the appointment of commissioners, to be sent to 
Europe to negotiate for a recognition and, in the event of war, possibly, 
for assistance. The Constitution ordained that the President " shall 
have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Congress, to 
make treaties, provided two-thirds of the Congress concur ; and he 
shall nominate and, by and with the advice and consent of the Con- 
gress, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, 
etc." Thus was the treaty-making power vested in the President ; and 
Congress had no authority to instruct the commissioners or to shape 
their negotiations. 

Statesmen of the South expected that the commissioners would be 
sent as plenipotentiaries, instructed to propose, as conditions of our 
recognition and alliance, to England, France, and other nations, that 
the Confederate States, for twenty years, would lay no higher duties 
on their productions imported than, say, twenty per cent, ad valorem • 
that for the same period no tonnage duties would be laid on their 
shipping, entering or leaving our ports, except what should be suffi- 
cient to keep in repair our harbors and rivers ; that the coast naviga- 
tion between ports of the Confederate States, during this time, should 
be free to them, subject only to police regulations ; that upon the 
productions and tonnage of all nations refusing to recognize our inde- 
pendence there should be imposed a discriminating duty of, say, ten 
per cent, additional ; and that, if necessary — but not otherwise — the 
Confederate States government should make a league, offensive and 
defensive, with special guarantees — for instance, a guarantee to Great 
Britain of British America. 

The tender of such treaties would have offered immense advantages 
to England and to France. With their great capital, and cheaper and 
more skilful labor, low duties for twenty years, with a discrimination of 
ten per cent, against their competitors for the markets of the Confeder- 
ate States, would have enabled them to furnish our supplies at enormous 
profits ; and a tariff of twenty per cent, ad valorem would, according 
to experience, have yielded to our government the largest obtainable 
revenue, without in any way oppressing our people. The lucrative 
carrying trade of the Confederate States on the high seas, and the 
coasting trade, hardly less remunerative, would have been chiefly 
theirs, with less cost to our people. 



THE DIPLOMACY OF THE CONFEDERATE GOVERNMENT 91 

Would the Palmerston-Russell ministry have ventured to decline 
such a proffer of mutual benefits, and to persist in the policy of non- 
intervention ? If it had, then the subject would have been taken 
straight into Parliament, with almost a certainty that the Whig min- 
istry would have been speedily voted down, and the Conservative 
administration of Lord Derby and Mr. Disraeli placed in power. And 
there can be little doubt that that administration would promptly 
have entered into such a treaty. Even the Whig Foreign Secretary, 
Lord John Russell, openly expressed the opinion that the dissolution 
of the American Union would be permanent, and the Confederate 
States successful. John Bright, the Quaker Radical, and Richard 
Cobden, the Independent Liberal of the Manchester school of politics, 
then supporting the Whig administration, represented manufacturing 
constituencies, and were noted advocates of free trade and low duties. 
It is more than likely that, in view of such benefits, their prejudices 
against the South and partialities for the North would have been nul- 
lified and overridden by the calls of unmistakable and gigantic inter- 
est to the people of England. The Emperor of the French, Louis 
Napoleon, was friendly in feeling to the South, and would gladly 
have joined England in such a programme. Without such induce- 
ments he proposed a mediation in October, 1862. 

Under the action of the Confederate Congress the President ap- 
pointed commissioners to Europe, with the Hon. William L. Yancey 
at the head of the commission, to go to England. But the instruc- 
tions given him were not such as the past policy and political position 
occupied by the South naturally suggested ; not such as Mr. Yancey 
expected ; not such as the Secretary of State, the Hon. Robert Toombs, 
advocated ; and not such as other leading Southern statesmen deemed 
of vital importance to the cause. Instead of seeking to use the power 
of laying duties and passing navigation laws, to conciliate the support of 
foreign nations ; instead of using the treaty-making power, which 
was paramount to the legislative, to obtain the recognition of the 
independence of the Confederate States, the President gave no author- 
ity to the commissioners to make commercial treaties, or to agree to 
confer special trade or navigation interests. The commission went 
without powers. It had nothing to propose and, therefore, nothing 
to treat about. The administration seemed to have no comprehension 
of the importance of appealing to the interests of foreign nations for 
the establishment of our independence. In addition to abstract dis- 
quisition it appeared to rely chiefly on compelling England by her 
dependence touching the supply of cotton for her manufactories. If 
there was really superior sagacity in forecasting the magnitude of the 
struggle in which the South was involved — which has been claimed, 



92 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

but which plain facts go far to refute — then the only explanation of 
this unexpected and ultimately fatal policy, on the part of President 
Davis, appears to have been the entertainment of a design by him to 
foster manufacturing classes in the Confederate States, and for that 
purpose to hold in the hands of the government the power of dis- 
crimination in laying duties on foreign commodities to the utmost 
extent practicable, and free from committals by treaties. This idea 
has support from the course of the administration in regard to the 
obtainment of arms and munitions of war, and the procurement of a 
navy. 

When the Confederate commission presented itself in London it 
was received by the British Minister for Foreign Affairs, and inter- 
views were held between them. But Mr. Yancey, as we have seen, 
was powerless. He had nothing to propose or to treat about. So when 
the minister of the United States, Mr. C. F. Adams, on the 12th of 
June, 1S61, expressed the "great dissatisfaction" of his government, 
coupled with a threat to retaliate, if such interviews continued, the 
British Minister, having ascertained that it was the policy of the 
Confederate government to use the commercial dependence of England 
to obtain compulsory recognition, and to make no treaties conferring 
advantages in trade or commerce, cut short further official intercourse. 
Not until November, 1861, were Messrs. Mason, Slidell, Mann, and 
Eost sent over to Europe. And they, too, had only arguments to 
offer concerning legal rights and precedents unacceptable to mon- 
archies ; and they accomplished nothing. Our attempts at diplomacy 
were an egregious failure. In the language of the chairman of the 
Committee of Foreign Affairs, in the Confederate Senate, from 1862 
to 1865 — the Hon. James L. Orr — "the Confederate States had no 
diplomacy." 



THE BATTLE OF SHILOH, AND THE PART PLAYED 
THEREIN BY HENRY WATKINS ALLEN, EX-GOV- 
ERNOR OF LOUISIANA. 

[From Recollections of Henry Watkim Allen (180G).J 

BY SARAH A. DORSEY. 

[Sarah Anne (Ellis) Dorsey was born in Natchez, Miss., February 16, 1829. Upon 
her marriage to Samuel W. Dorsey, a planter of Tensas Parish, La., she removed to her 
husband's home. In 1875, after the death of Mr. Dorsey, she went to live at Beau voir. 
Miss. She died in New Orleans, July 4, 1879. Her works include Recollections of 
Henry Watkins Allen (18(56): Lucia Dare (1867); Agnes Graham (1869); Atalie; or, A 
Southern Villeggiatura (1871); and Panola: a Tale of Louisiana (1877).] 

The morning of the 6th of April dawned before Johnston got his 
lines ready for battle. Twenty-four hours had been lost through the 
rain and the difficulty of moving rapidly his undisciplined levies over 
the heavy roads. The enemy were encamped along a broken country, 
a succession of hills and valleys — filled with woods, interspersed with 
an occasional open field. Their principal camp was near a log-cabin 
used as a meeting-house, called " Shiloh." Their line stretched away 
on the road leading from Pittsburg Landing to Corinth ; their camps 
generally located in the small open fields, scattered at intervals 
throughout the forest. The battle was, therefore, necessarily fought 
in fractions ; giving opportunities for exhibitions of personal courage 
and deeds of heroic daring, always eagerly welcomed by Southern men. 
Johnston and Beauregard had formed the army in three parallel lines 
of battle — the first under Hardee, the second under Bragg, the hist 
under Polk and Breckinridge ; each line had its centre and two flanks, 
protected by artillery and cavalry. Johnston was with the second 
line under Bragg, and Beauregard was with the third line under Polk 
and Breckinridge. This resume of events was needful in order to 
make the reader understand why the battle of Shiloh was fought — 
the first field on which Henry W. Allen was engaged and was wounded 
in the service of the country. He commanded his beloved Fourth 
Louisiana, in the line of Bragg. He was overflowing with military 
ardor and eager patriotism, and communicated magneticallv his ex- 
cited interest to his regiment, The Fourth Louisiana, as well as its 
colonel, was -ready for anything. The night previous, talking with 
some of my relatives, in their tent — discussing the probabilities of the 



94 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

morrow — Allen said very gravely, " A man ought always to expect to 
be killed in battle, and should be willing and prepared for death 
always before he goes into it ; " then he repeated the beautiful invoca- 
tion to death, from Halleck's Marco Boszaris. On the morning of 
the 6th he was ordered by Bragg to charge a battery of the enemy, 
stationed in a thicket ; it was a strong position on an eminence, and 
the guns were very troublesome. The aide-de-camp, who took the 
order to Allen, says : " I found him near a small copse or bosquet of 
woods. lie received the order in silence ; then turning his head 
around, he called his servant, Hyppolyte, who was standing near by. 
' Hyppolyte,' he said, in his rapid way, ' we are going to charge ; 
stand here in a safe place, but watch that flag,' pointing to the regi- 
mental colors. ' I shall either be before it or by it. If I fall, search 
for me, and take me to the rear if wounded ; if dead, bury me decently ; 
and now, God bless you, you have been a faithful servant,' wringing 
the hand of his now weeping slave. Allen led his regiment." Twice 
he charged on the battery ; his men were fearfully cut up, but they 
heard the rallying voice of their beloved colonel clear and distinct 
through the noise of battle, and they followed him through the storm 
of shot and shell unhesitatingly, never faltering an instant. Allen's 
heart bled to see his men dropping around him — wounded, dying. 
After the second charge he sent to tell General Bragg that his regi- 
ment was suffering fearfully, and to ask if he must make another 
charge with them. "Tell Colonel Allen I want no faltering now,'' 
was the stern reply. Allen was startled and stung at the unjust 
insinuation of lack of courage. He never forgot nor forgave it. Rising 
in his stirrups, without a word of reply, he waved his sword to his 
men to follow, and charged the guns once more. The men rolled from 
their saddles like leaves about him. This last charge was as useless 
and ineffectual as the other two. The enemy's position was too 
strong. A minie ball struck Allen in the mouth, as he cheered his 
men on this fruitless ride to death — for so many of them. The ball 
passed out through the cheek. Catching up a handful of cotton lint, 
Allen stuck it in the wound — which, though painful, was not serious — 
tied his handkerchief around his jaws with sangfroid, in the midst of 
the rain of bullets and shells. His clothes, cloak, and cap were riddled 
with shot-holes ; but he remained in his saddle all day, never quitting 
the field, but doing his utmost to the last lingering hours of daylight, 
before he sought medical relief or repose. The day declined on a 
glorious victory for the Confederates. Grant was cowering near the 
river under the protection of his gunboats, when Beauregard, careful 
of the lives of his men, finding them much wearied and exhausted 
from the day's work and want of food, discovering, too, that there was 



THE BATTLE OF SHILOH. 95 

some difficulty in manoeuvring with his raw, undrilled troops, ordered 
the pursuit to be checked, the lines re-formed, and the attack to be 
continued at daybreak on the following day. Grant was still strong 
behind his batteries along the river, and under the cover of his gun- 
boats. It is questioned whether Beauregard was right or wrong in 
checking this pursuit. But there are several points to be considered 
in viewing Beauregard's conduct at Shiloh. In the first place, his 
plans— owing to circumstances that he could not control — were only 
tardily carried into effect. 

" Rapidity in war depends as much on the experience of the troops 
as on the energy of the chief." 

Beauregard was always careful of the lives of his soldiers. Though 
an engineer, he would abandon any, the most cherished fortifications, 
to save his army. And also — 

" It is too common with soldiers, first, to break up the arrano- e - 
ments of their generals by want of discipline, and then complain of 
the misery those arrangements were designed to obviate." So it 
proved here. 

( )ur undisciplined forces became much demoralized by the sight of 
the rich booty they found spread before their victorious eyes, in the 
captured tents of the Federal encampments. The costly viands, the 
splendid accoutrements, were so many golden apples of Atalanta, to our 
poor, hungry, thirsty, weary boys. In vain the commanders stormed 
and raged; the gallant army, "who had rushed," Beauregard said, 
" like an Alpine avalanche " on the enemy, on the mornino- of that 
eventful day, at nightfall were mostly a dissolved, disorganized rabble 
of soldiers. 

The 7th of April broke upon Grant, reenforced by Buell. The 
( Ymfederates had been gathered in some order by their indomitable 
leaders. Grant attacked them, now strong in his reinforcements. 
On the centre and right he was steadily repulsed— he could make no 
impression there. The left he attacked obliquely, pouring line after 
line of fresh, vigorous troops on it, who were as continually repelled 
I >y the Confederate phalanx. But, opposed to an enemy who were 
constantly reenforced, the Confederate ranks were growing thin. A 
gentleman on Beauregard's staff narrated, with humor, to the writer, 
how he came unexpectedly on Colonel Allen, with his face still tied up 
in its improvised dressing of the previous day, trying to rally his broken 
troops, who were nearly decimated by the hard fighting he had led 
them into. He said : " There was Allen, his face tied up in a bloody 
handkerchief, with a bit of raw cotton sticking on his cheek — which 
certainly did not improve his beauty — one minute entreating, praying, 
weeping, tears streaming, as he implored the men to stand; the next 



96 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

moment, swearing, raging at them, abusing them, berating them, 
giving them ever}^ angry epithet he could think of ; then addressing 
them in the most affectionate words. But he succeeded in gathering- 
together not only his own men, but a number of stragglers from other 
regiments, whom he coaxed or abused back into the ranks. The last 
I saw of him, he was off with them like a whirlwind into the thick of 
the battle. It made me both laugh and cry to watch him. He was a 
regular Murat ; but instead of the ' white plume,'' it was the white 
speck of cotton, and head tied up in the white handkerchief, that was 
always in the van." According to General Beauregard, the number 
of Confederate troops engaged on the 6th, at the battle of Shiloh, was 
about 33,000— lost one-third. Grant had 55,000. On the 7th, the 
Confederate force did not exceed 17,000. The Federals had : Buell 
22,000, Lewis Wallace 8,000, Grant 10,000 or 15,000, making nearly 
45,000 in all. The battle-ground extended about two miles and a half 
or three miles. The Federal loss in the two days' fights was nearly 
20,000, killed, wounded, and taken prisoners. On the first day of the 
battle, while the Confederates were pressing Grant down on his gun- 
boats, the firing was very heavy on the part of the boats' batteries, in 
order to cover Grant's retreat. The great conical shells were rather 
alarming to our verdant, unused troops. They would strike and cut 
down large trees with a neatness and despatch that startled tyros in the 
art of war. We were all somewhat timid, at that time; about bombard- 
ments from mortars and howitzers, a timidity that we soon got rid of 
as the war progressed, especially all of us living on the water-courses, 
where we were exposed to being shelled every day — we got used to it. 
However, these marine batteries did considerable damage to our troops 
at Shiloh, killing and wounding the men frightfully, until they got 
inside the range of the boats' guns. Allen was leading his men in the 
fight when one of these huge messengers of death demolished a tree 
in front of him, and lodged in the earth at his horse's feet. Seeing 
the extremity of danger to his men, Allen spurred his horse, leaped 
the cavity formed by the unexploded shell, waving his sword and 
calling to his men to follow him. They obeyed instantaneously, and 
were all safe beyond when the shell exploded. By his presence of 
mind and coolness, he thus preserved his men and his own life, 
-x- * * * * * * -:■:- 

After eighteen hours' hard fighting, Beauregard thought it best to 
withdraw his wearied troops to his camp at Corinth. General Breck- 
inridge covered with his command the gradual withdrawal of the 
Confederate army. This retreat is regarded as a remarkable one. It 
was managed so quietly, so rapidly, so steadily, so skilfully, the enemy 
were completely deceived. Breckinridge presented a bold, resolute 



THE BATTLE OF SHILOH. 97 

front to the last hour, while Beauregard drew back his lines without 
confusion, and concentrated them again at Corinth. Sydney John- 
ston had been killed : the news of his death, and his mode of meeting- 
it, sent a pang of regret and bitter remorse through every Southern 
heart. We recognized, too late, the great spirit of the man we had 
driven to reckless desperation. 

Colonel Allen had retired at last, his wound growing painful from 
the twenty-four hours' neglect to have it properly dressed by a surgeon. 
"While under the surgeon's hands, he heard the cry of retreat raised 
by the wagon-drivers. Jumping up, he rushed among them, mounted 
on his horse, and aided greatly in restoring order among this portion 
of the army. Afterwards, when he got time, the dressing of the 
wound was completed. His careless treatment of this wound in the 
face, which he regarded so slightly at this time, caused him much 
unnecessary pain from it ever after. 



THE BATTLE OF CHANCELLORSVILLE. 

[From A Soldier's Story of the War.] 

BY NAPIEK BARTLETT. 

[Napier Bartlett was born and brought up in Georgia. He changed his residence 
in early manhood to New Orleans, where he became distinguished as a journalist. 
During the Civil War, he served with distinction in the Confederate Army. After the 
war, he was at different times editorially associated with various newspapers of his 
adopted city. He was the author of Clarimonde, a novelette ; Stories of the Crescent 
City ; and A Soldier's Story of the War. He died in 1877, in the forty-first year of 
his age. 

The spring of '63 has meanwhile passed, and the roads have com- 
menced to harden. The men absent from camp have grown weary 
of cities, and the old soldiers about winter quarters shout lustily 
when a popular general passes by — a sure sign that they have regained 
their old combative feeling, and a sign, too, that they will soon be 
called upon to make use of it. The battery forges are kept constantly 
busy, and the ringing of Callahan's blacksmith's hammer in his labors 
for the benefit of the battery horses, and the flying sparks which 
gayly shoot upward, begin to intoxicate the blood of men. 

During the close of April, the rumbling of the artillery wheels 
and the weary tramp of the infantry are once more heard. Hooker 
has daringly thrown his army across the Rappahannock, and waded 
them through the Rapidan, a deep tributary, and has made a move 
which causes Lee rather to open his eyes. However, the advantage 
lasts but a moment. The Confederate troops are promptly gathered 
up, and boldly moved forward ; Jackson being thrust out in the same 
way, on the enemy's flank, as the one-armed Captain Cuttle would his 
hook — to drag the enemy in. Hooker, meanwhile, has occupied the 
ground, which, if he only knew it, and would hold on to it, would gain 
him the battle ; but he becomes timid, with a greatly superior force, 
as Lee becomes daring, and meanwhile his army is like one of those 
read of in the classic page, which gets bogged up in a swamp, or 
trembling prairie, or overwhelmed by the Libyan or Arabian sands ; 
or as in the Shipwreck, where the whole of the Duke's Court are 
Avandering about on an unknown land, encountering enemies, and 
coming across friends, in all manner of fantastic ways. At one end 
of the line — Hooker's left, which faces toward Richmond — is the old 



THE BATTLE OF CHANCELLORSVILLE. 99 

Chancellor House. It will soon be dripping with more blood than 
ever was put in a sensational tragedy or novel. Against one of its 
pillars Hooker is leaning in the battle, when stunned by the concussion 
against it of a shell. 

On Friday morning (May 1st) the opposing columns began to 
jostle each other, and Hooker now can emerge from the tangled 
thicket in which he has been so far groping ; but it is his last chance. 
It is one thing to mark out a campaign brilliantly, and another to 
execute it unflinchingly, with new difficulties to be provided for on 
the battle-field, at every step. As the Irish duellist explained it, to 
hit the stem of a wine-glass with a bullet is not difficult — provided 
the wine-glass has no pistol. 

Hooker once had emerged from his dangerous position, where his 
army could not manoeuvre, but was either driven back, or took up 
from choice, according to Northern accounts, a line with rising ground 
in front, and with impenetrable thickets behind, from which the Con- 
federate attacks could readily be formed. The night which followed 
passed silently in both armies — silently, so far as the guns were con- 
cerned ; but faint noises told of the shovelling up of rifle-pits ; thou- 
sands of midnight woodcutters, as if suddenly possessed with a super- 
stitious fancy for making a clearing, were causing the Wilderness, 
on both sides, to resound with their blows, or bringing to the ground 
some of the huge trunks, with a noise equal to cannon. 

The falling of these trees meant, for Hooker, that he would await 
an attack ; for Lee, that he knew Hooker's plan, and would go off and 
make an attack somewhere else. He will act upon Jackson's last and 
most brilliant idea, and send the latter around by an obscure farm 
road on Hooker's right, between him and his river communications. 
This move of Jackson, thought to be a retreat to Richmond, strikes 
the Federal right at five o'clock on the afternoon of May 2d, and by 
dark it has put a whole corps to utter rout. Jackson lias got on the 
reverse side of the enemy, to within half a mile of headquarters. He 
is now about to deal his finishing blow, and while anxiously seeking 
the precise situation of the enemy, gets his death- wound in the dark, 
at the hands of some of his own pickets. His loss left the battle 
incomplete, in spite of its stunning blow, and the melancholy news 
affected the Confederates in the same way that the fulfilment of the 
various omens predicted before Troy could be captured affected that 
city's defenders. On the other hand, if Jackson had not been 
wounded, as he said on his dying bed, " the enemy would have been 
obliged to surrender or cut his way out.'' 

On the nex,t day, Stuart, in Jackson's place, bore down and pressed 
back the Federal right wing, while Lee on the opposite side ham- 



100 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

mered away at Hooker's centre and left, forcing back two corps ; or, 
as a Korthern * historian expresses it, " the line melted away, and the 
front appeared to pass out.'" Hancock, who alone held out, began to 
waver at ten a.m., w T hen " the Confederates sprang forward and seized 
Chancellorsville." 

Fredericksburg during this time had been left with a small force 
of five brigades, including the First and Second Louisiana* and three 
companies of the Washington Artillery, who had been ordered from 
Chesterfield three days before to the crest of Marye's Hill — their 
old battle-ground. Barksdale was still with us. The latter, Sunday 
morning, in view of a movement by Sedgwick's corps on this part of 
the line, were reenforced by Hays's brigade. After three failures in 
other directions, a powerful assaulting column was formed to carry 
the hill by storm, which feat was finally achieved, though " under a 
very severe fire that cost Sedgwick a thousand men. The Confeder- 
ates made a savage hand-to-hand fight on the crest, and over the eight 
guns." As there was only, in reality, two regiments (less than two 
thousand men) assigned to the support of our artillery, and the attack 
was made by twenty-two thousand of the enemy (according to Sedg- 
wick's report), it will not appear surprising that the works were 
finally captured. The guns were worked desperately to the last, and 
were faithfully manned by their cannoneers, when six pieces were 
surrounded, and the guns and cannoneers made prisoners — most of 
them under the command of Captain Squires and Lieutenant E. 
Owen. A large proportion of the gallant Eighteenth and a part of 
the Twenty-first Mississippi were taken prisoners at the same time. 

Sedgwick now commenced moving on the slender brigades who 
had been retained here by Lee to make up a show before the enemy 
and retain his line of communications with Richmond ; Early mean- 
while retreating slowly toward Lee. He did not do so long. Before 
the day was over, a sufficient force, McLaw's and Anderson, were 
promptly sent back to Early's support. The shock occurred at Salem 
Chapel, and all that need be said about it was that Sedgwick was 
checked that day, " with a total loss of five thousand men." f Marye's 
Hill was reoccupied the next day without any difficulty by its former 
possessors. 

On Monday night, May 4th, Sedgwick being surrounded on three 
sides, and hard pressed as to his communications with the river, took 
advantage of the darkness, and was fortunate enough to safely with- 
draw his troops. 

Lee having cleared, as it were, the brushwood from his path, was 
now (May 6th), with the troops whom lie had recalled, prepared to 

* Swinton's History of the Army of the Potomac. f Swinton, p. 299. 



THE BATTLE OF CHANCELLORSVILLE. 101 

attend to the case of Hooker ; but that general was found to have 
lost all stomach for a fight, and had put the Eappahannock between 
himself and the enemy. 

The result of the matter — and this was about the whole result, 
except that new material for powder had to be provided — was that 
the Union loss was 17,197, and the Confederate 10,281. All of the 
spoils, in the way of artillery, prisoners, and twenty thousand stand 
of arms, fell to the Confederate army. The victory, in short, was a 
glorious one, but really amounted to nothing, as Jackson disappeared 
from the scene at the moment when most needed, and the result was 
incomplete. 



THE DISBANDMENT OF THE WASHINGTON 
ARTILLERY IN 1865. 

[From In Camp and Battle with the Washington Artillery (1885).] 

BY WILLIAM MILLER OWEN. 

[William Miller Owen was born in Cincinnati. 0., January 10, 1832. At the 
opening of the Civil War, he went to Virginia with the Washington Artillery of New 
Orleans, serving with distinction in that command until Lee's surrender. After the war, 
he published In Camp and Battle with the Washington Artillery, a narrative breathing 
the spirit of the bivouac, the march, and the battle. He contributed various articles 
to Scribner's Magazine, the Century, and the United States Service. In 1890 he assisted 
Mrs. Jefferson Davis in the preparation of the military chapters of her Memoir of her 
husband. He died in New Orleans, January 10, 1893.] 

Another night was spent sleeping soundly in the mud and rain, 
and this a.m. (11th), according to instructions, I had my teams hitched 
up and moved my three batteries (twelve guns) to the main road, where 
I turned them over to the Federal officer detailed to receive them. 
Returning to our " shelter " I was visited by General John G. Hazard, 
Chief of Artillery of the Second Corps IT. S. A., and his Adjutant- 
General, Captain T. Fred Brown. 

We couldn't extend to the General much polite attention, but we 
did the best we could under existing circumstances. Officers and men 
of the Federal army mingled freely with our officers and men around 
our camp-fires, and not a harsh word was spoken on either side. 

In fact, the conduct of the victors was beyond all praise. They sent 
our starving men provisions, and not a shout of exultation nor the 
music of a band was heard during all the time we were at Appomattox. 
A feeling of great and deep sadness filled the breasts of our army, and 
a feeling of delicate sympathy pervaded the other. Brave men who 
had looked into each other's eyes for four long years along the shining 
musket-barrel, and across the deadly, blazing trench, understood and 
respected one another. 

Something was said about our joining together under the "old 
flag " and inarching to drive Maximilian out of Mexico, and I believe 
we would have gladly gone, but nothing came of it. 

On the morning of the 10th, General Meade called to pay his 
respects to General Lee. The latter reported to his staff after the 
visit, that the conversation had naturally turned upon the recent 



THE DISBANDMENT OF THE WASHINGTON ARTILLERY. 103 

events, and that General Meade had asked him how many men lie had 
at Petersburg at the time of General Grant's last assault. He told him 
in reply that, by the last returns, he had thirty-five thousand muskets 
(35,000). General Meade then said, " You mean you had thirty-five 
thousand men on the lines immediately around Petersburg ? " to which 
General Lee replied, " No, that he had but that number from his left 
on the Chickahominy Eiver to his right at Dinwiddle Court-IIouse." 
At this General Meade expressed great surprise, and stated that he 
then had with him, in one wing of the Federal army which he com- 
manded, over fifty thousand men. The number of Confederates 
paroled was between twenty-six thousand and twenty-seven thousand.* 
On the morning of April 12th, our battalion and the remnants of 
other battalions to be paroled were assembled for the last time in front 
of our camp-fire, and I read to them the farewell address of General 
Lee, as follows : 

Headquarters Army of Northern Virginia, 

Appomattox Court-House, April 10, 1865. 
General Orders No. 9 : 

After four years of arduous service, marked by unsurpassed courage and forti- 
tude, the Army of Northern Virginia has been compelled to yield to overwhelming 
numbers aud resources. 

I need not tell the brave survivors of so many hard-fought battles, who have 
remained steadfast to the last, that I have consented to this result from no distrust 
of them; but feeling that valor and devotion could accomplish nothing that would 
compensate for the loss that must have attended a continuance of the conflict, I 
determined to avoid useless sacrifice of those whose past services have endeared 
them to their countrymen. By the terms of the agreement, officers and men can 
go to their homes and remain until exchanged. 

You will take with you the satisfaction that proceeds from the consciousness 
of duty faithfully performed, and I earnestly pray that a merciful God will extend 
to you his blessiug and protection. 

With an unceasing admiration of your constancy and devotion to your country, 
and a grateful remembrance of your kind and grateful consideration for myself, I 
bid you an affectionate farewell. 

It. E. Lee. 

The men listened with marked attention and with moistened eyes 
as this grand farewell from our old chief was read, and then receiving 
each his parole they every one shook my hand warmly and bade me 
good-by, and breaking up into parties of three and four turned their 
faces homeward — some to Richmond, some to Lynchburg, and some 
to far-off ruined Louisiana. 

I watched them until the last man disappeared with a wave of his 
hand around a curve of the road ; then mounting our horses and tak- 
ing a sad farewell of Generals Lee, Longstreet, Gordon, and Latrobe, 

* Four Years with Lee. Taylor. 



104 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

Taylor, Cullen, and Barksdale, we rode away from Appomattox. And 
now — 

"Oh, farewell! 
Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump, 
The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife, 
The royal banner; and all quality, 
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war ! 
And oh, you mortal engines, whose rude throats 
The immortal Jove's dread clamors counterfeit, 
Farewell ! " 

We rode forty miles upon our return journey, and bivouacked in a 
tobacco-barn near Cumberland Court-House, and obtained some corn- 
bread and milk from a kind-hearted old negro woman. Our party 
consisted of Captain E. Owen, Lieutenant-Colonel J. Floyd King, 
Major Thomas Brander, and William Fellowes. 

Bright and early we resumed our ride until we crossed the James, 
and halted at the hospitable home of Mr. Logan, in Goochland, 
where the family gave us a hearty welcome, yet withal a sad one ; 
they had lost all hope for the future. We rested well — frequently 
falling asleep while talking with our hosts. 

The night before our lines were broken at Petersburg the boys of 
the section of the First Company Washington Artillery, under Lieu- 
tenant Battles, placed in my possession for safe-keeping their old 
battle-flag, as it was too much torn and riddled by bullets to be any 
longer used. I took it and hung it up in my quarters at Gregg 
House. 

Next morning, when the assaults were being made upon the Fort 
(Gregg), and the bullets were flying thick and fast, I remembered the 
flag, and, riding up to the window where it hung, broke in the sash 
with my sabre and secured it. I carried it in my saddle-pocket as 
far as Amelia Court-House, where I transferred it to John Logan, 
who was going home, with instructions to give it to his sisters for 
safe-keeping. The girls concealed it in a sofa cushion, and after Lee's 
army had retreated, Federal cavalry came to the house, and officers 
slept upon the sofa, and laid their heads upon this piece of bunting. 
The cushion now having been produced, a few cuts with a knife re- 
vealed the tattered guidon. While it is very wrong to "kiss and 
tell," it must nevertheless be recorded that Captain Owen bestowed a 
hearty kiss all round. 

This little relic now occupies an honored place with other flags in 
the arsenal of the Washington Artillery, in New Orleans. 

We ended our journey, and rode into Richmond on the 18th of 
April ; and as we passed through Main Street furtive glances were 



THE DISBANDMENT OF THE WASHINGTON ARTILLERY. 105 

cast and little white handkerchiefs were waved at us by the ladies at 
the windows of their houses. Main Street (the business part of it) 
was in ruins. 

Officers in blue were lounging about our usual haunts. Soldiers in 
blue had usurped the places of the boys in gray. 

At the outpost, when we entered the city, we were kindly received 
by the officer in charge, and were informed by him that President 
Lincoln had been assassinated. We told him that we sincerely re- 
gretted that it was so. He said, " Yes, I am sorry for you all ; for it 
will go hard with you now, and the whole South." 

The 22d of April found us still in Eichmond. We are not 
allowed "to go to our homes unmolested," on account of the assas- 
sination. 

I sold my horse and a mule, and this put us in funds. Fortunately 
some kind friends had saved my trunk of reserve clothing, but I 
thought it prudent to purchase a suit of ready-made garments and a 
round-top hat. 

Some rows having occurred at the " Spottswood Hotel," between 
Confederate and German Federal officers, we were politely requested 
to leave ; so we hired apartments on Franklin Street, and from our 
windows witnessed the army of General Sherman pass through en 
route for Washington. We finally took the amnesty oath at the 
State House, and called upon General Halleck at the " White House," 
to ask permission to leave the city. 

When I crossed the threshold of that house, how many pleasant 
memories it brought to mind, what visions and plans of happiness 
that were never to be realized ! 

How my heart went out to Mr. Davis and his family, now in so 
much trouble and distress ! 

We laid our request before General Halleck, and were refused 
unceremoniously ; but, nevertheless, the next morning we were, 
incognito, on board the steamboat Georgiana, bound for Fortress 
Monroe and Baltimore. 

We took leave of our friends in Richmond with sincere regret ; all 
had been so kind to us, we had begun to consider it our home. While 
we were detained in Richmond, awaiting permission to depart, a 
delegation of officers called upon General Lee to find out what he 
would say in regard to a half -formed resolution we had made to go to 
Brazil and enter the army. 

The General was indisposed, but General Custis Lee told us that it 
was the expressed wish of his father that everybody should " go home 
and help build up the country." The Brazilian army obtained no 
recruits. 



106 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

On the 16th of May we arrived at Baltimore, and stopped at 
" Barnum's Hotel," and were entertained at the " Maryland Club." 

The 28th of May found us snugly located at the "New York 
Hotel," in New York City, and dropping in at Brooks's, Ave arrayed 
ourselves in swell garments, and felt and looked like gentlemen of 
elegant leisure once more. 

I dined with Mr. William Travers, and hunted up my old friends, 
the Gilmans, all of whom I found, to my unspeakable regret, mar- 
ried. They had a hearty welcome for me and called me their " rebel 
friend," and insisted upon my saying, over and over again, " I am so 
sorry ! " 

Latrobe joined us here, but stayed but a day. Happening to see 
an outrageous caricature of Mr. Davis hanging in front of Barnum's 
Museum, on Broadway, he in great disgust hurried away to Boston, 
and took a Cunarder for England. 

On the 3d of June, Captain Hilary Cenas, C. S. Navy, and I, took 
passage on board the steamship Monterey, bound for New Orleans. 

On the third day out we learned, through the purser, that a num- 
ber of " Pelicans " were passengers in the steerage. So both of us, 
taking a bottle of champagne under each arm, climbed down the com- 
panion-way into the dimly lighted 'tween-decks, and introducing our- 
selves to our compatriots we were enthusiastically received, and 
popped the corks and had a jolly time.* 

On the 13th of June, 1865, we walked into the "St. Charles 
Hotel," in New Orleans, where we found officiating, as head clerk, 
Andy Blakely, an ex-member of the Washington Artillery, who took 
us in and cared for us, and we slept once more under a Louisiana sky, 
and were preyed upon and bled by the long since forgotten Louisiana 
mosquito. 

In the morning, my last piece of " fractional currency " (twenty- 
five cents) was invested in a Picayune and a mild refreshing bev- 
erage, and stepping out upon the broad stone balcony of the hotel, 
into the warm, delicious June sunshine, I took up again the broken 
thread of a business life without a dollar in the world, emphatically 
and completely " busted." 

* The names of those returning soldiers were as follows : John A. Lafaye, Numa 
Landry, Ernest Landry, Henry Starr, M. O'Neil, Honore Flotte, Alfred Latnothe, 
Leon Lamothe, Octave Legier. 



THE CONFEDERATE ADMINISTRATION AND ITS 

DOWNFALL. 

[From The Military Operations of General Beauregard. Copyright, 1883, by 
Harper & Brothers.] 

BY ALFRED ROMAN. 

In defending the territory, population, and supply resources of 
the Southern States, the success or failure of the Confederate adminis- 
tration may be judged by a brief presentment of cardinal points. By 
the devoted courage and unsurpassed endurance of our volunteers, 
accepted in insufficient numbers, ill-fed, ill-clothed, and ill-armed, but 
led by officers of ability, brilliant victories had been achieved over the 
invading forces of the North ; and drawn battles, hardly less distin- 
guished, had been fought against heavy odds. But, although the 
armies of the United States had received terrible repulses on various 
occasions, they certainly made considerable progress in occupying 
important portions and positions of the Confederacy. In 1861 were 
fought the battles of Bethel, June 10th ; Manassas, July 21st ; Ball's 
Bluff, October 21st — in Virginia ; and in Missouri the battles of Spring- 
held, August 10th ; Lexington, September 21st ; Belmont, November 
7th. In 1802 the battle of Seven Pines, May 31st ; Port Republic, 
June 8th ; the seven days' battles near Richmond, at the end of June ; 
Cedar Run, July 19th ; second Manassas, July 29th, 30th, 31st — in Vir- 
ginia ; followed by Boonsboro' and Sharpsburg, on the 11th and 17th 
of September. In the West there were fought the battle of Elkhorn, 
in Arkansas, March 5th ; Fort Henry and Fort Donelson, Tenn., on 
the 5th and 16th of February ; and Shiloh, in North Mississippi, on the 
6th and 7th of April. The Confederate States lost the harbor of 
Port Royal, S. C, November 7th, 1861; Norfolk, with its Navy 
Yard, May, 1862 ; and also Pensacola — these constituting the finest 
ports on the Southern coast. Of the cities, St. Louis and Louis- 
ville were lost in 1861 ; Nashville, in February, 1862 ; New Orleans, in 
April; Galveston, in May; Memphis, in June. Besides these, the 
Mississippi River was lost, and also the three States of Missouri, Ken- 
tucky, and Tennessee, whose young men, generally, were with the Con- 
federacy in feeling, and, if they had had encouragement and timely 
assistance, would have recruited the Southern armies with thousands of 
brave soldiers. These States were all the more important on account 
of their large production of grain crops, meat, horses, and mules ; and 
their loss was a series of severe blows to the Confederacy. . . . 



108 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

It is notable that before September, 1802, public opinion concern- 
ing the management of Confederate affairs had undergone a decided 
change, and that grave doubts respecting the competency of the 
Executive to guide the destinies of the South were entertained by 
many who had the opportunity of knowing what was done and what 
was omitted. 

Fearing the result of such a feeling, Congress — which, upon the 
formation of the government, had never resorted to secret sessions 
except on very important occasions — began to transact no small 
amount of its business with closed doors ; and secret sessions, hereto- 
fore the exception, now became almost the prevailing rule. There 
doubtless were circumstances under which it was eminently right to 
keep the North from knowing what took place in the legislative halls 
of the South. In war secrecy is often an element of success. But on 
many other occasions, and when there was no necessit}^ to conceal 
anything from our enemies, the people of the Confederate States were 
kept in ignorance of their own affairs, and of the views and opinions 
of their representatives. Thus was the formation of public opinion 
restricted, if not altogether obstructed, and criticism on the conduct 
of the business of the people, in a degree, suppressed ; thus was the 
power of the government gradually brought into the hands of the 
President, who was already possessed of enormous patronage, not to 
speak of the veto power. The people were cut off from the opportu- 
nity of finding a remedy for errors, no matter how gross and vital 
they might be. But there were results so patent that they could 
not be withheld from sight ; and in some of these the public could 
not help perceiving a mismanagement which could only lead to 
disaster. 

In the war of 1812 with England, and in the Mexican war of 1846, 
the general government called upon the States for troops needed 
in addition to the regular army ; and the State authorities organized, 
officered, and sent forth their respective quotas. During the late war 
the Federal government again called upon the governors of the 
States for the soldiers required, and received them, officered, at their 
hands. But the President of the Confederate States, after declining 
to accept the services of thousands upon thousands of volunteers ten- 
dered, and after opposing bills offered in Congress in January, 1862, 
authorizing him to call for troops from the States to the number of 
fifty thousand and upward, as late as March, 1862, drove Congress, 
on the plea of necessity, to pass an act of conscription, which set aside 
the authority of the States, and gave the Executive power to conscribe 
the people and appoint the officers. This arbitrary and unwarranted 
step, taken without the least foresight or sagacity, wholly unneces- 



THE CONFEDERATE ADMINISTRATION AND ITS DOWNFALL. 109 

sary and unpopular, did not strengthen the administration or the 
cause with the people of the South. To this was afterward added 
unjust impressments of private property for the use of the Govern- 
ment, makeshifts odious to a free people, and resorted to, in a great 
measure, to assist the notorious incompetency of many appointees of 
the administration — most conspicuous among whom was the well- 
known and proverbially inefficient Commissary-General of the Con- 
federate States. 

As events rolled on, foreshadowing the inevitable effects of per- 
sistently recurring causes, anxiety and distrust of the Confederate 
government, which the Executive head had all but absorbed and jeal- 
ousy controlled, pervaded the minds of all intelligent men who were 
informed and were not blinded by partiality or warped by personal 
interest. And the dreaded result at last came. The weight of num- 
bers — though not that weight alone ; the prestige of reputed consti- 
tuted Federal authority abroad — though not that prestige alone ; but, 
concurring with these, want of sagacity, inefficiency, improvidence, 
and narrow-mindedness on the part of the administration; egotism 
and illiberality ; culpable loss of time and of opportunity — these, 
altogether and combined, brought on the annihilation of the hope of 
Southern independence. 

At the close of hostilities between the two contending sections the 
picture was a dark one. Civil strife, whatever be its cause, whatever 
its purpose, carries with it ruin, and is followed by cruel remem- 
brances. During nearly six years after the furling of the Confederate 
battle-flag there was added to the mortification of defeat for the 
South the disheartening reality of humiliation and distinctive oppres- 
sion. Power and the sense of victory achieved are not always accom- 
panied by conciliation, justice, and generosity. Yet the South was 
earnest in laying down her arms, and accepted the result of the war 
with a brave and honest spirit. Time, the great soother of all human 
woes, has begun and is advancing with its work of pacification and 
obliteration. It is now a fact that the Southern States are as faithful 
supporters of Federal government as any of the Northern States of 
the Union. 

Notwithstanding the cloud that has darkened its political horizon, 
a great future lies before the whole American Republic. Gradually 
emerging from her ruin, and without slavery, the South possesses her 
peculiar agricultural advantages, and is becoming both maufacturing 
and commercial in character. In the days of renewed prosperity to 
come, [let Southerners recall] to mind and to honor the patriot soldiers 
and the statesmen who made every sacrifice in what they conscien- 
tiously believed to be the defence of constitutional liberty. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT AND RADICALISM. 

[From Destruction and Reconstruction. Copyright, 1879, by D. Appleton & Company.] 

BY RICHARD TAYLOR. 

[Richard Taylor, only son of General Zachary Taylor, was born in New Orleans, 
January 27, 1826. In early youth he studied the classics in Edinburgh, Scotland, and 
in France. On his return to the United States he entered Yale College, from which he 
was, in due time, graduated. During the Mexican War, he served in the Army under 
his illustrious father. In 1861 he was elected to the Louisiana Secession Convention, in 
which he distinguished himself as a debater. During the strife which followed — whether 
as Colonel of the Ninth Louisiana Volunteers, or as Brigadier-General, or as Major- 
General, or yet as Lieutenant-General — he reflected honor on himself and the cause for 
which he fought. After the war, he sought recreation in Europe. He then returned 
home, and played no small part in the politics of his State. In his Destruction and 
Reconstruction (1879) he records his reminiscences of Secession, War, and Reconstruc- 
tion. His literary style is limpid, vigorous, and entertaining. He was one of the 
most remarkable conversationists of his times. He died in New York City, April 12, 
1879.] 

Since the spring of 1873, when he gave himself up to the worst 
elements of his party, I have not seen President Grant ; but his career 
suggests some curious reflections to one who has known him for thirty- 
odd years. "What the waiting- woman promised in jest, Dame Fortune 
has seriously bestowed on this Malvolio, and his political cross-garter- 
ings not only find favor with the Radical Olivia, but are admired by 
the Sir Tobys of the European world. Indeed, Fortune has conceits 
as quaint as those of Haroun al-Raschid. The beggar, from profound 
sleep, awoke in the Caliph's bed. Amazed and frightened by his 
surroundings, he slowly gained composure as courtier after courtier 
entered, bowing low, to proclaim him King of kings, Light of the 
World, Commander of the Faithful ; and he speedily came to believe 
that the present had always existed, while the real past was an idle 
dream. Of a nature kindly and modest, President Grant was assured 
by all about him that he was the delight of the Radicals, greatest 
captain of the age, and savior of the nation's life. It was inevitable 
that he should begin by believing some of this, and end by believing 
it all. Though he had wasted but little time on books since leaving 
West Point, where in his day the curriculum was limited, he had found 
out to the last shilling the various sums voted by Parliament to the 
Duke of Wellington, and spoke of them in a manner indicating his 
opinion that he was another example of the ingratitude of republics. 



ULYSSES S. GRANT AND RADICALISM. Ill 

The gentle temper and sense of justice of Othello resisted the insidious 
wiles of Iago ; but ignorance and inexperience yielded in the end to 
malignity and craft. President Grant was brought not only to smother 
the Desdemona of his early preferences and intentions, but to feel no 
remorse for the deed, and take to his bosom the harridan of radicalism. 
As Phalaris did those of Agrigentum opposed to his rule, he finished 
by hating Southerners and Democrats. 

During the struggle for the Presidency in the autumn of 1876, he 
permitted a member of his Cabinet, the Secretary of the Interior, to 
become the manager of the Radicals and use all the power of his 
office, established for the public service, to promote the success of his 
party's candidate. 

Monsieur Fourtou, Minister of the Interior, removed prefects and 
mayors to strengthen the power of De Broglie ; whereupon all the 
newspapers in our land published long essays to show and lament the 
ignorance of the French and their want of experience in republican 
methods. One might suppose these articles to have been written by 
the " seven sleepers," so forgetful were they of yesterday's occurrences 
at home ; but beams near at hand are ever blinked in our search of 
distant motes. The election over, but the result in dispute, President 
Grant, in Philadelphia, alarmed thoughtful people by declaring that 
"no man could take the great office of President upon whose title 
thereto the faintest shadow of doubt rested," and then, with all the 
power of the Government, successfully led the search for this non- 
existing person. To insure fairness in the count, so that none could 
carp, he requested eminent statesmen to visit South Carolina, Florida, 
and Louisiana, the electoral votes of which were claimed by both 
parties ; but the statesmen were, without exception, the bitterest and 
most unscrupulous partisans, personally interested in securing victory 
for their candidate, and have since received their hire. Soldiers were 
quartered in the capitals of the three States to aid the equitable states- 
men in reaching a correct result by applying the bayonet if the figures 
proved refractory. With equity and force at work, the country might 
confidently expect justice ; and justice was done — that justice ever 
accorded by unscrupulous power to weakness. 

But one House of the Congress was controlled by the Democrats, 
and these, Herod-like, were seeking to slay the child, the Nation. To 
guard against this, President Grant ordered other troops to Washing- 
ton and a ship-of-war to be anchored in the Potomac, and the child 
was preserved. Again, the 4th of March, appointed by law for the 
installation of Presidents, fell on Sunday. President Grant is of 
Scotch descent, and doubtless learned in the traditions of the land o' 
cakes. The example of Kirkpatrick at Dumfries taught him that it 



112 HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 

was wise to " mak sicker " ; so the incoming man and the Chief Justice 
were smuggled into the White House on the sabbath day, and the oath 
of office was administered. If the chair of George Washington was 
to be niched, it were best done under cover. The value of the loot 
inspired caution. 

In Paris, at a banquet, Maitre Gambetta . . . toasted our 
ex-President " as the great commander who had sacredly obeyed and 
preserved his country's laws." Whether this was said in irony or 
ignorance, had General Grant taken with him to Paris his late Secre- 
tary of the Interior, the accomplished Z. Chandler, the pair might 
have furnished suggestions to Marshal MacMahon and Fourtou that 
would have changed the dulcet strains of Maitre Gambetta into dismal 
howls. 



PART II. 



SPECIMENS OF ORATORY 



AGAINST THE ELIGIBILITY OF A CITIZEN BORN OUT- 
SIDE OF THE UNITED STATES, TO THE GOVERN- 
ORSHIP OR LIEUTENANT - GOVERNORSHIP OF 
LOUISIANA.* 

BY JOHN E. GRYMES. 

[John Randolph Grymes, born in Orange County, Va., in 1786 ; died in New Orleans, 
December 4, 1854. Vide p. 62.] 

Can any one in this Chamber suppose that a foreigner can rid 
himself of all love for his native land from the moment he comes 
among us ? For myself, I am free to say that I do not believe this ; 
and I venture to affirm that a foreigner, whose heart and soul can so 
easily expatriate themselves, would prove for Louisiana but a poor, a 
very poor acquisition. 

An American may acquire either German or French naturalization 
if his interests demand it ; but if that American should renounce, at the 
same time, all affection for this happy country which is his natural 
right, I would prefer that he should continue to deny his mother to 
the end. Nay, the foreigner who should entertain for our institutions 
merely a rational attachment would be a hundred-fold, a thousand- 
fold preferable to such a man. It is the sheerest folly to pretend that 
the voice of our common nature can be so easily silenced. That 
nature reigns in us all, acts by us all, speaks through us all, in spite of 
ourselves ; and each one cherishes in his heart, so long as it beats 
within his breast, those feelings of family and native land which God 
at the creation so wisely implanted there. Fancy, if you can, what 
would be the position of a Governor of foreign birth, if an army 
formidable in numbers, and carrying the standard of the land in which 
he first saw the light, should without warning profane the frontiers of 
Louisiana. We are told that our eyes shall be blasted by no other 
wars. This is an error. What has been may — nay, probably will be 
again. And in such a case who can fail to see that a native of the 
invading country, placed at the head of our armies of defence, must 
be exposed to an almost irresistible temptation to betray the cause of 
wnich he is constituted the official champion ? Never will that man 

* [From remarks delivered in the Senate of Louisiana, February 13, 1845, during 
the debate on Section 6, as submitted in the Report of the Legislative Committee on the 
new State Constitution.] 



116 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

face upon the field of battle the friends of his boyhood and the com- 
rades of his youth, with such courage and steadfastness as a soldier of 
American birth. Even those highest qualities of mind and heart, with 
which such alien leader might be credited, would become sinister. 
Within him, higher than honor itself, will speak the voice of Nature ! 
He will hesitate at the employment of any aggressive measure, and 
that hesitation will bring disaster in its train, and perhaps the ruin 
of the country. Ah, we need a native citizen at the head of the 
phalanxes of the State ! The mere sight of the enemy irritates 
and influences such a man. He advances with head erect and heart 
palpitating. For him there is no middle ground between victory and 
death ; while in the heart of the naturalized citizen there would beat 
a secret scruple, an innate feeling of repugnance, which would paralyze 
at once his energy in the field and his counsels in the cabinet. In 
spite of what Mr. Preston may affirm to the contrary, a man's oath is 
not so strong as nature, and he cannot be born twice. He may be 
baptized an American, but such political baptism cannot prevent the 
heart's voice of that man from ever inspiring him unto tenderness, 
when it repeats the accents, when it recalls the scenes, when it mur- 
murs the affections of his first country. 

But suppose we forget the days of Avar, ever unhappy, and steady 
ourselves upon those epochs, more or less flourishing, with which our 
long peace has blessed us. The election of a naturalized citizen to 
the office of Governor would become a subject of perpetual strife in 
Louisiana, that rich and fertile land of ours, upon which, with each day, 
masses of immigrants from all nations, but especially from France, 
Ireland, and Germany, throw themselves. Beyond doubt, as I have 
already indicated, future immigrants to our State will harbor those 
sentiments which lead men to prefer their own countrymen. They 
will naturally, if the opportunity were accorded them, elevate one of 
their own countrymen to the highest office of this Republic, and — if 
they should succeed in their lofty purpose — it is clear that the fortu- 
nate mortal upon whom their choice may fall will not hesitate to 
distribute among these friends and compatriots at once the official 
loaves and fishes, and thus quicken into acute danger the rivalries and 
murmurs of naturalized citizens from other nations of the globe. 
" Look at that German," will sneer Irishmen and Frenchmen who 
are made Americans by our laws, " look at that German ! Since 
he has become Governor, he cares only for his own people; but 
patience, our turn Avill come." Yes ; but, in the meantime, there 
must arise an endless coil of strife, and, worse than strife, of corrup- 
tion festering upon our body-politic — and this is precisely what Ave, 
standing here, are commissioned to prevent. 



ELIGIBILITY TO THE GOVERNORSHIP OF LOUISIANA. 117 

And let not the reverse of the medal be turned to tell me that a 
Governor born under our national flag will, on his side, display 
partiality toward his own fellow-countrymen. Under the menace of 
such a fear, I cannot see how any one can be justified in complaining. 
All things being equal, our native citizens are invested with a natural 
right to stand in the foremost rank, and to be the recipients of the 
first favors. The naturalized citizen might be accused of presumption 
even to wish to compete with them. Who can deny that our native 
citizens show themselves far more generous ? They permit their Gov- 
ernor to protect these naturalized citizens, and God knows if experi- 
ence has not proved that our people have long been accustomed to 
see our foreign-born citizens occupying most of the profitable offices 
of our city and State. 

Why, then, should we heed that fretful voice which tells us that, 
after we have opened wide the majestic portals of our Commonwealth 
to all other rights, we dare to draw the distinction contemplated in 
the clause in question ? This privilege of making sure that a foreigner 
shall never sit in the highest seat of our State is the sole right which 
belongs to him whose ancestors founded its Government. And that 
man must be either very malicious or steeped in ambition, who would 
attempt to dispute with him this little point of greatness, this slight 
distinction in the midst of the debris with which, for long years to 
come, we will be encumbered. 



THE SONS OF NEW ENGLAND.* 

BY SEAKGENT S. PRENTISS. 

[Seabgent Smith Prentiss was born in Portland, Me., September 30, 1808. In 
1826 he was graduated from Bowdoin College. In 1827 he removed to Mississippi, and 
in 1829 was admitted to the bar of Natchez. In 1835 he was sent to the Legislature 
of his adopted State. In 1837, when elected as a Whig to the lower house of Congress, 
he challenged unsuccessfully the seat of his Democratic competitor, but supported his 
claim in a speech which established his reputation as a parliamentary debater. De- 
feated, he returned to Mississippi. After a series of speeches in his district, he gained 
at the next Congressional election a large majority. From 1840 to 1844 he canvassed 
the State in opposition to the repudiation of its bonded debt. In 1845, chagrined at the 
passage of that measure, he removed to New Orleans. In that city he began the study 
of Civil Law, in the practice of which he sustained his reputation for eloquence and 
analvtic power. He died at Longwood, near Natchez, Miss., July 1, 1850. Vide 
p. 124.] 

It is not for the sons of New England to search for the faults of 
their ancestors. We gaze with profound veneration upon their awful 
shades ; we feel a grateful pride in the country they colonized — in the 
institutions they founded — in the example they bequeathed. We exult 
in our birthplace and in our lineage. 

Who would not rather be of the Pilgrim stock than claim descent 
from the proudest Norman that ever planted his robber blood in the 
halls of the Saxon, or the noblest paladin that quaffed wine at the 
table of Charlemagne ? Well may we be proud of our native land, 
;iiid turn with fond affection to its rocky shores. The spirit of the 
Pilgrims still pervades it, and directs its fortunes. Behold the thou- 
sand temples of the Most High, that nestle in its happy valleys and 
crown its swelling hills. See how their glittering spires pierce the blue 
sky, and seem like so many celestial conductors, ready to avert the 
lightning of an angry Heaven. The piety of the Pilgrim patriarchs 
is not yet extinct, nor have the sons forgotten the God of their fathers. 

[And] the spirit of the Pilgrims survives, not only in the knowl- 
edge and piety of their sons, but, most of all, in their indefatigable 
enterprise and indomitable perseverance. They have wrestled with 
Nature till they have prevailed against her, and compelled her 
reluctantly to reverse her own laws. The sterile soil has become pro- 

* [From an oration delivered December 22, 1845, before the New England Society 
of New Orleans.] 



THE SONS OF NEW ENGLAND. 119 

ductive under their sagacious culture, and the barren rock, astonished, 
finds itself covered with luxuriant and unaccustomed verdure. 

Upon the banks of every river they build temples to industry, and 
stop the squanderings of the spendthrift waters. They bind the naiades 
of the brawling stream. They drive the dryades from their accus- 
tomed haunts, and force them to desert each favorite grove ; for upon 
river, creek, and bay, they are busy transforming the crude forest into 
stanch and gallant vessels. From every inlet or indenture along the 
rocky shore swim forth these ocean birds — born in the wild wood, 
fledged upon the wave. Behold how they spread their white pinions 
to the favoring breeze, and wing their flight to every quarter of the 
globe — the carrier pigeons of the world ! It is upon the unstable 
element the sons of New England have achieved their greatest tri- 
umphs. Their adventurous prows vex the waters of every sea. Bold 
and restless as the old Northern Vikings, they go forth to seek their 
fortunes in the mighty deep. The ocean is their pasture, and over its 
wide prairies they follow the monstrous herds that feed upon its azure 
fields. As the hunter casts his lasso upon the wild horse, so they 
throw their lines upon the tumbling whale. The}'' " draw out Levia- 
than with a hook." They " fill his skin with barbed irons," and in 
spite of his terrible strength they " part him among the merchants." 
To them there are no pillars of Hercules. They seek with avidity 
new regions, and fear not to be "the first that ever burst" into 
unknown seas. Had they been the companions of Columbus, the 
great mariner would not have been urged to return, though he had 
sailed westward to his dying day. 

Glorious New England ! thou art still true to thy ancient fame 
and worthy of thy ancestral honors. We, thy children, have assem- 
I (led in this far-distant land to celebrate thy birthday. A thousand 
fond associations throng upon us, roused by the spirit of the hour. 
On thy pleasant valleys rest, like sweet dews of morning, the gentle 
recollections of our earlv life ; around thy hills and mountains cling\ 
like gathering mists, the mighty memories of the Revolution; and 
far away in the horizon of thy past gleam, like thine own northern 
lights, the awful virtues of our Pilgrim sires ! But while we devote 
this day to the remembrance of our native land, we forget not that in 
which our happy lot is cast. We exult in the reflection that, though 
we count by thousands the miles which separate us from our birth- 
place, still our country is the same. We are no exiles meeting upon 
the banks of a foreign river, to swell its waters with our homesick 
tears. Here floats the same banner which rustled above our boyish 
heads, except that its mighty folds are wider and its glittering stars 
increased in number. 



120 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

The sons of New England are found in every State of the broad 
Republic. In the East, the South, and the unbounded West, their 
blood mingles freely with everv kindred current. "We have but 
changed our chamber in the paternal mansion ; in all its rooms we 
are at home, and all who inhabit it are our brothers. To us the Union 
has but one domestic hearth; its household gods are all the same. 
Upon us, then, peculiarly devolves the duty of feeding the fires upon 
that kindly hearth ; of guarding with pious care those sacred house- 
hold gods. 

We cannot do with less than the whole Union ; to us it admits of 
no division. In the veins of our children flows Northern and South- 
ern blood ; how shall it be separated ? Who shall put asunder the best 
affections of the heart, the noblest instincts of our nature ? We love 
the land of our adoption ; so do we that of our birth. Let us ever be 
true to both, and always exert ourselves in maintaining the unity of 
our country, the integrity of the Republic. 



APPEAL IN BEHALF OF THE FAMINE-STRICKEN 

IKISH* 



BY SEARGENT S. PKENTISS. 



It is no ordinary cause which has brought together this vast assem- 
blage on the present occasion. We have met not to prepare ourselves 
for political contests, nor to celebrate the achievements of those gallant 
men who have planted our victorious standards in the heart of an 
enemy's country. We have assembled not to respond to shouts of 
triumph from the West, but to answer the cry of want and suffering 
which comes from the East. The Old World stretches out her arms 
to the New. The starving parent supplicates the young and vigorous 
child for bread. 

There lies upon the other side of the wide Atlantic a beautiful 
island, famous in story and in song. Its area is not so great as that of 
the State of Louisiana, while its population is almost half that of the 
Union. It has given to the world more than its share of genius and 
of greatness. It has been prolific in statesmen, warriors, and poets. 
Its brave and generous sons have fought successfully all battles but 
their own. In wit and humor it has no equal ; while its harp, like its 
history, moves to tears by its sweet but melancholy pathos. Into this 
fair region God has seen fit to send the most terrible of all those fear- 
ful ministers who fulfil his inscrutable decrees. The earth has failed 
to give her increase ; the common mother has forgotten her offspring, 
and her breast no longer affords them their accustomed nourishment. 
Famine, gaunt and ghastly famine, has seized a nation with its strang- 
ling grasp ; and unhappy Ireland, in the sad woes of the present, 
forgets for a moment the gloomy history of the past. We have 
assembled to express our sincere sympathy for the sufferings of our 
brethren, and to unite in efforts for their alleviation. This is one 
of those cases in which we may, without impiety, assume, as it were, 
the function of Providence. Who knows but what one of the very 
objects of this great calamity is to test the benevolence and worthi- 
ness of us upon whom unlimited abundance has been showered ? In 
the name, then, of common humanity, I invoke your aid in behalf of 
starving Ireland. 

Oh, it is terrible, that in this beautiful world which the good God 
* [Delivered before the citizens of New Orleans, February 7, 1847.] 



122 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

has given us, and in which there is plenty for us all, that men should 
die of starvation ! In these days, when improvement in agriculture 
and the mechanical arts have quadrupled the productiveness of labor, 
when it is manifest that the earth produces every year more than suf- 
ficient to clothe and feed all her thronging millions, it is a shame and 
a disgrace that the word starvation has not long since become obso- 
lete, or only retained to explain the dim legends of a barbarous age. 
You who have never been be} T ond the precincts of our own favored 
country ; you, more especially, who have always lived in this great 
valley of the Mississippi — the cornucopia of the world — who see each 
day poured into the lap of your city food sufficient to assuage the 
hunger of a nation, can form but an imperfect idea of the horrors of 
famine — of the terror which strikes men's souls when they cry in vain 
for bread. 

When a man dies of disease, he alone endures the pain. Around 
his pillow are gathered sympathizing friends, who, if they cannot 
keep back the deadly messenger, cover his face and conceal the hor- 
rors of his visage as he delivers his stern mandate. In battle, in the 
fulness of his pride and strength, little recks the soldier whether the 
hissing bullet sings his sudden requiem, or the cords of life are 
severed by the sharp steel. But he who dies of hunger wrestles 
alone, day after day, with his grim and unrelenting enemy. He has 
no friends to cheer him in the terrible conflict ; for if he had friends, 
how could he die of hunger \ He has not the hot blood of the soldier 
to maintain him ; for his foe, vampire like, has exhausted his veins. 
Famine comes not up like a brave enemy, storming, by a sudden onset, 
the fortress that resists. Famine besieges. He draws his lines around 
the doomed garrison ; he cuts off all supplies ; he never summons to 
surrender, for he gives no quarter. Alas for poor human nature ! hoAV 
can it sustain this fearful warfare ? Day by day the blood recedes, the 
flesh deserts, the muscles relax, and the sinews grow powerless. At 
last the mind, which at first had bravely nerved itself for the con- 
test, gives way under the mysterious influences which govern its 
union with the body. Then he begins to doubt the existence of an 
overruling Providence ; he hates his fellow-men, and glares upon them 
with the longings of a cannibal, and, it may be, dies blaspheming ! 

Who will hesitate to give his mite to avert such awful results \ 
Surely not the citizens of New Orleans, ever famed for deeds of benev- 
olence and charity. Freely have your hearts and purses opened 
heretofore to the call of suffering humanity. Nobly did you respond 
to oppressed Greece and struggling Poland. Within Erin's borders 
is an enemy more cruel than the Turk, more tyrannical than the 
Russian. Bread is the only weapon that can conquer him. Let us 



APPEAL IN BEHALF OF THE FAMINE-STRICKEN IRISH 123 

then load ships with this glorious munition, and in the name of our 
common humanity wage war against this despot Famine. Let us in 
God's name " cast our bread upon the waters," and if we are selfish 
enough to desire it back again we may recollect the promise, that it 
shall return to us after many days. 

If benevolence be not a sufficient incentive to action, we should be 
generous from common decency ; for out of this famine we are adding 
millions to our fortunes. Every article of food, of which we have a 
superabundance, has been doubled in value by the very distress we 
are now called to alleviate. We cannot do less, in common honest v, 
than to divide among the starving poor of Ireland a portion of the 
gains we are making out of their misfortunes. Give, then, generously 
and freely. Recollect that in so doing you are exercising one of the 
most godlike qualities of your nature, and at the same time enjoying 
one of the greatest luxuries of life. We ought to thank our Maker 
that he has permitted us to exercise equally with himself that noblest 
of even the Divine attributes, benevolence. Go home and look at 
your family, smiling in rosy health, and then think of the pale, fam- 
ine-pinched cheeks of the poor children of Ireland ; and I know you 
will give, according to your store, even as a bountiful Providence 
has given to you — not grudgingly, but with an open hand ; for the 
quality of benevolence, like that of mercy, 

" Is not strained. 
It droppeth like the gentle rain from heaven, 
Upon the place beneath : It is twice blessed, 
It blesses him that gives, and him that takes." 

It is now midnight in Ireland. In a wretched hovel a miserable, 
half -starved mother presses to her shrivelled breast a sleeping infant, 
whose little care-worn face shows that the coward Famine spares not 
age or sex. But lo ! as the mother gazes anxiously upon it and listens 
to its little moaning, the hdby smiles! The good angel is whispering 
in its ear that at this very moment, far across the wide sea, kind 
hearts and generous hands are preparing to chase away haggard 
hunger from old Ireland, and that ships are already speeding rapidly 
to her shores, laden with the food which shall restore life to the 
parent and renew the exhausted fountain of its own young existence. 



SEARGENT S. PRENTISS.* 

BY HENRY A. BULLARD. 

[Henry Adams Bullard was born in Groton, Mass., September 9, 1788. In 180T 
he took his B. A. degree at Harvard. He began the practice of law in Natchitoches, La. 
He represented Louisiana in Congress in 1831-32, and then was appointed District Judge. 
He was for about twelve years an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 
and served a few months as Secretary of the State. In 1847 he was elected Professor of 
Civil Law in the Law Department of the University of Louisiana. "His opinions while 
on the bench," says his biographer, "are models of judicial rhetoric, brief, perspicuous, 
and pointed. He wrote without effort, yet with a critical accuracy that defied correc- 
tion." He died in New Orleans, April 17, 1851.] 

[Our departed friend] was a native of the State of Maine — the most 
northern part of the Union. Reasoning a priori, one would naturally 
suppose he would have possessed merely an understanding and judg- 
ment as solid and compact as the granite of her hills, and a tempera- 
ment as cold as her climate. Who would have expected to find in a 
child of Maine, the fiery, inventive genius of an Arabian poet ? — an 
imagination as fertile in original and fantastical creations, as the author 
of the Thousand and One Nights ? Let us not imagine that Nature is 
so partial in the distribution of her gifts. The flora of more Southern 
climes is more gorgeous and variegated, but occasionally there springs 
up in the cold North a flower of as delicate a perfume as any within 
the tropics. The heavens in the equatorial regions are bright with 
the golden radiance, and the meteors shoot with greater effulgence 
through the air ; but over the snow-clad hills of the extreme North 
flash from time to time the glories of the aurora horealis. Under 
the line are found more numerous volcanoes, constantly throwing up 
their ashes and their flames, but none of them excel in grandeur the 
Northern Hecla, from whose deep caverns rolls the melted lava down 
its ice-bound sides. 

I think I can assert with confidence, that Prentiss possessed the 
most brilliant imagination of any man of this day. He had more of 
the talent of the Italian improvisatore than any man living, or who 
ever lived in this country. It is a great error to suppose that he was 
a mere declaimer. On the contrar}^, there was found always at the 
bottom a solid basis of deep thought. He never preached without a 
text. Even on convivial occasions, when he gave full rein to his 
fancy, his oratory consisted of something more than merely gorgeous 
imagery, sparkling wit, and brilliant periods. He sought to illus- 

* [ Eulogy delivered at a meeting of the New Orleans bar, December 6, 1850.] 



SE ARGENT S. PRENTISS. 125 

trate some great truth. He was not satisfied with stringing together 
a few smart sentences and commonplace remarks, but that rich pro- 
fusion of brilliant metaphors which he threw out on such occasions 
tended to illustrate some great, important principle. Such was his 
remarkable gift of throwing an attractive beauty over every subject 
upon which his imagination lighted, that under his hand a truism 
became a novelty. 

As a lawyer I can testify that Prentiss was diligent — even inde- 
fatigable in his researches. His arguments were always solid and 
thorough. It has, indeed, been sometimes objected that he pressed 
his arguments beyond conviction. He never drove a nail that he did 
not clinch it, and sometimes, perhaps, by clinching it too tight, broke 
off the head. For it is, permit me to say, sometimes the fault of 
lawyers, of great intellectual vigor and fertility of imagination, that 
they push an argument so far as to produce the impression that 
their own convictions are not altogether sincere and satisfactory to 
themselves. But Prentiss possessed the peculiar faculty of rendering 
every subject which he treated attractive and interesting. When he 
attended the courts in the country, and it was given out that he was 
to speak, it was sure to attract a large audience of ladies and gentle- 
men. I remember a case in the Supreme Court in the Western Dis- 
trict in which he was engaged. The court-house was crowded, and 
a large number of ladies graced the room. It was a simple case of 
usury, which most of us would have argued by reference to a few 
adjudicated cases and upon general principles. In the hands of 
Prentiss it became a prolific theme for the richest imagery and the 
most striking novel illustrations. Shylock became ten times more 
hideous and revolting in his picture of the modern usurer, while at 
the same time he argued the legal questions involved with singular 
vigor and acuteness. Indeed, there was no subject so dry, no chasm 
so deep, but he could span it over with the rainbow of his imagina- 
tion — a rainbow in which the most varied hues were beautifully com- 
mingled in one gorgeous arch of light. 

The fame of such a man could not be narrowed down to the limits 
of a single State, or section of our country. It extended over the 
Union. It shone with splendor in the halls of Congress, in other 
cities and States, and wherever he passed he was called on to address 
the people upon the great topics of the day. I have been assured, 
that even in Faneuil Hall, whose walls reechoed the first cry of 
Liberty and Independence— where the greatest orators of their day 
thundered forth their noblest efforts — where the impassioned elo- 
quence of the elder, and the silvery tones of the younger Otis had been 
uttered— where the Dexters, the Everetts, and Choate, and Webster, 



126 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

and others, bad maintained their ascendency over that cool, reflecting, 
and intellectual people — even there, when Prentiss appeared and 
poured forth the torrent of his gorgeous elocution, his auditors sprang 
to their feet under the influence of his magic power. 

I have heard most of the eminent men of the day, and can freely 
say that I have never heard any man who combined in so eminent a 
degree the reasoning faculty with brilliancy of fancy, felicity of 
language, and copiousness of illustration. There are undoubtedly 
more learned men, more perfect scholars and rhetoricians — more 
skilled in polishing a sentence and taming a metaphor ; but none 
from whom rolled forth, as it were spontaneously, such brilliant 
thought and startling and novel figures. In this respect his speeches 
resembled the displays of the skilful pyrotechnist — his metaphors 
thrown up like rockets in the evening sky, and bursting as they rose 
into a thousand dazzling points of every imaginable color. 

Poor Prentiss ! what can I say of the noble qualities of his heart ? 
Who can describe the charms of his conversation in moments of 
relaxation and social intercourse ? Old as I am, his society was one 
of my greatest pleasures. I became a boy again. His conversation 
resembled the ever-varying clouds that cluster round the setting sun 
of a summer evening — their edges fringed with gold, and the noiseless 
and harmless flashes of lightning spreading, from time to time, over 
their dark bosoms. Who would have thought that I, whose career is 
ended — that I, whose sands are fast dropping away — that I, with my 
age and physical infirmities — I, whose children no longer require a 
father's solicitude — should have survived to pay this feeble tribute to 
his memory ; while he, the young, the noble-hearted, the gifted, in 
the fulness of fame and usefulness, sinks into an early grave, and 
leaves behind him a youthful and pious wife, and four orphan chil- 
dren, to weep for his loss. How inscrutable are the ways of Provi- 
dence ! 

It is the fate of great improvisatoH, that, though they exercise a 
powerful influence over their contemporaries, and their fame is brilliant 
and extended in their day, they leave behind them but few and faint 
memorials of their greatness and their genius. Such is eminently the 
case with Patrick Henry and Seargent S. Prentiss. The effect of 
their eloquence lives mainly in the memory of those who enjoyed the 
rare happiness of hearing them. Very little remains of all the power- 
ful displays of Patrick Henry, except the meagre sketch of a speech or 
two preserved by his biographer. How many brilliant effusions we 
have all heard from Prentiss, of which there is no permanent record, 
and which must pass away with the memories of those who listened 
to them ! Permit me to allude to one occasion, which many of you 



SE ARGENT S. PRENTISS. 127 

may remember, and which illustrates this remark. Some years ago a 
public meeting was called at Dr. Clapp's church, with a view to raise 
a subscription to procure a statue of Franklin, to be executed by the 
great American artist, Hiram Powers. The occasion called forth all 
the eloquence and stores of erudition of Richard Henry Wilde, then 
fresh from the classic scenes of Italian art. It happened that Prentiss 
bad just arrived in the city, without any knowledge of such a meeting. 
lie was dragged into the church by some of his friends, and, to avoid 
observation, took his seat in a side aisle. As soon as Mr. Wilde had 
closed, there was a cry for Prentiss, Prentiss ! He came forward, 
obviously surprised and embarrassed ; but, warming with the theme 
as he advanced, proceeded to pour forth to an enchanted audience one 
of the most brilliant and remarkable bursts of eloquence, which, I 
venture to assert, ever fell from any individual so suddenly and un- 
expectedly called on. A stranger would have supposed that he had 
done nothing during his life but study the poets and the line arts, and 
was familiar with the best models. He exhibited on that occasion an 
extraordinary familiarity with the poets and the arts, and no one 
would have supposed he had ever read a law book in his life. And 
yet, of that speech there remains not the slightest vestige. It could 
not, indeed, have been Well reported. To have caught up its brilliant 
scintillations would have been as difficult as to sketch the meteors that 
shoot through the sky. Indeed, I may say that if all the great and 
brilliant thoughts that fell from Prentiss, in popular and deliberative 
assemblies, in courts of justice, at convivial parties, and in his social 
intercourse, could have been faithfully reported by a stenographer, it 
would form a work truly Shakespearean. There would be found 
1 >eautif ully blended the broad humor and even ribaldry of Falstaff , the 
keen wit of Mercutio, the subtlety of Hamlet, and the overwhelming 
pathos of Lear. 

But, alas! the wand of Prospero is broken. We shall no more 
hear the eloquent tones of his voice, nor admire the specious miracles 
produced by the inspiration of his genius ; for he possessed the only 
inspiration vouchsafed to man in these latter days. We shall no longer 
be permitted to laugh over his mirth-provoking wit, nor be melted by 
his touches of true feeling, nor admire those rich gems which he threw ' 
out with such profusion from the exhaustless stores of his imagination. 
Such is the destiny of earthly things — 

" The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
The solemn temples — the great globe itself, 
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, 
And, like this unsubstantial pageant faded, 
Leave not a rack behind." 



VIRTUE THE CORNER-STONE OF REPUBLICAN 
GOVERNMENT.* 

BY JUDAH P. BENJAMIN. 

[Judah Philip Benjamin was born in St. Croix, West Indies, August 11, 1811. 
In youth, he studied for three years at Yale College. Removing to New Orleans in 
1831, he was in due course admitted to the Louisiana bar. In 1842 he was elected to 
the United States Senate, and in 1857 was reelected to the same seat. On the secession 
of Louisiana (February 4, 1861), he and his colleague, John Slidell, withdrew from the 
Senate. On the formation of the Provisional Government of the Confederate States, 
President Jefferson Davis appointed him Attorney General ; but soon after he resigned 
this dignity to accept that of Acting Secretary of War. Standing high in the confidence 
of President Davis, he was later appointed Secretary of State. On the downfall of the 
Confederacy, he took refuge in flight from the United States authorities ; and in Sep- 
tember, 1865, he landed in England. Called to the English bar, he wrote A Treatise on 
the Law of Sale of Personal Property (1868), which is at present the English authority 
on this subject. In 1872 he was made Queen's Counsel. On the 30th of June, 1883, 
compelled by failing health to retire from the practice of his profession, the English 
bench and bar tendered him a " farewell banquet " at Inner Temple, London. On this 
occasion the Lord Chancellor pronounced him " one of the men who in our own time has 
most illuminated and adorned the profession of the bar of England." Benjamin died in 
Paris, May 8, 1884.] 

One of the most eminent philosophers of modern times, who had 
made the science of government his peculiar study, after investigating 
what were the principles essential to every mode of government known 
to man, had announced the great result, that virtue was the very 
foundation, the corner-stone of republican governments ; that by 
virtue alone could republican institutions flourish and maintain their 
strength ; that in its absence they would wither and perish. There- 
fore it was that the enlightenment of the people by an extended sys- 
tem of moral education, their instruction in all those great elemental 
truths which elevate the mind and purify the heart of man, which, 
in a word, render him capable of self-government, were objects of 
the most anxious solicitude of our ancestors ; and the Father of his 
Country, in that farewell address which has become the manual of 
every American citizen, when bestowing the last counsels of a heart 
glowing with the purest and most fervent love of country that ever 
warmed a patriot's breast, urged upon his countrymen the vital neces- 
sity of providing for the education of the people, in language which 
* [Reprinted from The New Orleans Booh, 1851.] 



VIRTUE THE CORNER-STONE OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT. 129 

cannot be too often repeated : " It is substantially true that virtue 
or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, 
indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free govern- 
ment. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference 
upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric ? Promote, then, 
as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffu- 
sion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government 
gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should 
be enlightened." 

Recreant indeed should we prove to the duty we owe to our 
country ; unworthy indeed should we be of the glorious heritage 
of our fathers, if the counsels of Washington fell disregarded on our 
ears. 

But if that great man had so decided a conviction of the absolute 
necessity of diffusing intelligence amongst the people, in his day, how 
unspeakably urgent has that necessity become in ours ! In the first 
attempts then made to organize our institutions on republican princi- 
ples, the most careful and guarded measures were adopted, in order to 
confine the powers of the government to the hands of those whose 
virtue and intelligence best fitted them for the exercise of such 
exalted duties. The population of the country was sparse ; the men 
then living had witnessed the Revolution that secured our indepen- 
dence ; its din was still ringing in their ears ; they had purchased 
liberty with blood, and dearly did they cherish, and watchfully did 
they guard, the costly treasure ; the noblest band of patriots that 
ever wielded sword or pen in freedom's holy cause were still amongst 
them, shining lights, guiding by their example, and instructing by 
their counsels, to which eminent public services gave added weight. 
ISTow, alas ! the latest survivor of that noble band has passed away ! 
Their light has ceased to shine on our path. The population that then 
scarce reached three millions now numbers twenty ; and the steady 
and irresistible march of public opinion, constantly operating in the 
infusion of a greater and still greater proportion of the popular ele- 
ment into our institutions, has at length reached the point beyond 
which it can no farther go ; and from the utmost limits of the frozen 
North to the sunny clime of Louisiana, from the shores washed by 
the stormy Atlantic to the extreme verge of the flowery prairies of 
the Far West, there scarce breathes an American citizen who is not, 
in the fullest and broadest acceptation of the word, one of the rulers 
of his country. Imagination shrinks from the contemplation of the 
mighty power for weal or for woe possessed by these vast masses of 
men. If swayed by impulse, passion, or prejudice to do wrong, no 
mind can conceive, no pen portray, the scenes of misery and desola- 
9 



130 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

tion that must ensue. But if elevated and purified by the beneficent 
influence of your free public education, if taught from infancy the 
lessons of patriotism and devotion to their country's good, if so 
instructed as to be able to appreciate and to spurn the counsels of 
those who in every age have been ready to flatter man's worst pas- 
sions, and to pander to his most degraded appetites, for purposes < >f 
self-aggrandizement — if, in a word, trained in the school and imbued 
with the principles of our Washington, the most extravagant visions 
of fancy must fall short of picturing the vivid colors of the future that 
is open before us. The page of history will furnish no parallel to our 
grandeur ; and the great Republic of the Western World, extending 
the blessings of freedom in this hemisphere, and acting by its example 
in the other, will reach the proudest pinnacle of power and of greatness 
to which human efforts can aspire. And for the attainment of this 
auspicious result, how simple yet how mighty the engine which alone 
is required ! — a universal diffusion of intelligence amongst the people 
by a bounteous system of free public education. 

It has been said b}^ the enemies of popular government that its very 
theory is false — that it proceeds on the assumption that the greater 
number ought to govern : and the records of history, and the common 
experience of mankind, are appealed to in support of the fact that the 
intelligence and capacity required for government are confined to a 
small minority ; that only a fraction of this minority are possessed of 
leisure or inclination for the study and reflection which are indis- 
pensable for the mastery of the important questions on which the 
prosperity and happiness of a country must depend ; and that these 
men best qualified to be the leaders and guides of their countrymen 
in the administration of the government have the smallest chances of 
success for the suffrages of the people, by reason of the secluded habits 
engendered by application to the very studies required to qualify them 
for the proper discharge of public duties. Those who are attached to 
free institutions can furnish but one reply to these arguments : the 
premises on which they rest must be destroyed; the foundation of 
fact must be swept away ; and the majority, nay, the whole mass of 
the people, must be furnished with that degree of instruction which 
is required for enabling them to appreciate the advantages which flow 
from a judicious selection of their public servants, and to distinguish 
and reward that true merit which is always unobtrusive. Nor is this 
an Utopian idea ; if not easy of attainment, the object is at least 
practicable with the means that a kind Providence has supplied for us. 
The most sanguine advocates for public schools cannot, nor do they, 
pretend that each scholar is to become a politician or a statesman, any 
more than it would be practicable or desirable to make of each an 



VIRTUE THE CONNER-STONE OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT. 131 

astronomer or a chemist. But in the same manner as it would be use- 
ful to instruct all in the general outlines and striking facts of those 
sciences, it will not be found difficult to give to the youth of America 
such instructions in the general outlines and main principles of our 
government as would enable them to discriminate between the artful 
demagogue or the shallow pretender, and the man whose true merit 
should inspire their confidence and respect. This alone would suffice 
for all purposes connected with the stability and prosperity of our 
country and its institutions ; for not even the stanchest opponent of 
free government pretends that the mass of the people are swayed by 
improper motives, that their impulses are wrong, but only that their 
ignorance exposes them to be misled by the designing. 

The same eminent philosopher to whom I have already alluded, 
Montesquieu, after establishing the principle that virtue is the main- 
spring of democracies, alludes to this very subject of the education of 
the people in free governments, and remarks that it is especially for 
the preservation of such governments that education is indispensable. 
He defines what he means by virtue in the people, and declares it to 
be the love of our country and its laws ; the love of country which 
requires a constant preference of public interest to that of the indi- 
vidual, and which, to use his own language, is peculiarly affected to 
republics. In them, says he, the government is confided to all the 
citizens. Now, government is like all other earthly things : to be ] (re- 
served, it must be cherished. Who ever heard of a king that did not 
love monarchy, or of a despot who detested absolute power % Every- 
thing, then, depends on establishing this love of country, and it is to 
this end that education in republics ought specially to be directed. If 
this distinguished writer be correct in these remarks — and w r ho can 
gainsay them ? — how boundless the field for instruction and meditation 
which they afford ! How is a love of country, that love of country on 
which our existence as a nation depends, to be preserved, cherished, 
and made within us a living principle, guiding and directing our 
actions ? Love of country is not a mere brute instinct, binding us by 
a blind and unreflecting attachment to the soil, to the earth and rocks 
and streams that surrounded us at our birth. It is the offspring of early 
associations, springing up at the period when the infant perceptions 
are first awakened by the Creator to the beauteous works of his power 
which surround us, sustained and cherished by the memory of all the 
warm affections that glow in the morning of life. The reminiscences 
of our childish joys and cares, of the ties of family and of home, all 
rush back on the mind in maturer years with irresistible force, and 
cling to us even in our dying hour. England's noble bard never 
clothed a more beautiful thought in more poetic language than w T hen 



132 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

he depicted the images that crowded into the memory of the Gladiator 
dying in the Arena of Rome — 

" He recked not of the life lie lost, nor prize — 
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay ; 
There were his young barbarians all at play, 
There was their Dacian mother." 

But although these feelings are natural to man in all climes and 
ages, how intensely are they felt, how deeply do they become rooted in 
the hearts of those who, in addition to the early associations peculiar 
to each, are knit together in one common bond of brotherhood by the 
recollection of the great and noble deeds of those who have lived 
before them in the land ; who can point to records of historic lore and 
show the names of their country and her sons inscribed upon the 
brightest pages in the annals of the past ! What, then, are the means 
by which to kindle this love of country into a steady and enduring 
flame, chaste, pure, and unquenchable as that which vestals for their 
goddess guarded '"'. — your Free Public Schools. Let the young girl of 
America be instructed in the history of her country ; let her be taught 
the story of the wives and mothers of the Revolution ; of their devoted 
attachment to their country in the hour of its darkest peril ; of that 
proud spirit of resistance to its oppressors which no persecution could 
overcome ; of that unfaltering courage which lifted them high above 
the weakness of their sex, and lent them strength to encourage and to 
cheer the fainting spirits of those who were doing battle in its cause : 
and when that girl shall become a matron, that love of country will 
have grown with her growth and become strengthened in her heart, 
and the first lessons that a mother's love will instill into the breast of 
the infant on her knee will be devotion to that country of which her 
education shall have taught her to be justly proud. Take the young 
boy of America and lead his mind back to the days of Washington. 
Teach him the story of the great man's life. Follow him from the 
moment when the youthful soldier first drew his sword in defence of 
his country, and depict his conduct and his courage on the dark battle- 
field where Braddock fell. Let each successive scene of the desperate 
Revolutionary struggle be made familiar to his mind ; let him trace 
the wintry march by the blood-stained path of a barefooted soldiery 
winding their painful way over a frozen soil ; teach him in imagina- 
tion to share the triumphs of Trenton, of Princeton, and of Yorktown. 
Let him contemplate the Hero, the Patriot, and the Sage, when the 
battle's strife was over and the victory secured, calmly surrendering 
to his country's rulers the rank and station with which they had 
invested him, withdrawing to the retirement of the home that he 



VIRTUE THE CORNER-STONE OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT. 13& 

loved, and modestly seeking to escape the honors that a grateful 
people were to bestow. Teach him to appreciate the less brilliant but 
more useful and solid triumphs of the statesman ; tell him how at the 
people's call, the man that was " first in war, first in peace, and first in 
the hearts of his countrymen, , ' abandoned the calm seclusion that he 
cherished, again, at an advanced age, to expose himself to the stormy 
ocean of public life : first, to give aid and counsel to his countrymen 
in devising a frame of government that should forever secure their 
liberties ; and then, by his administration of that government, to fur- 
nish a model and guide for the Chief Magistrates that were to succeed 
him. And then lead him at length to the last sad scene, the closing 
hour of the career of the greatest man that earth has ever borne, to 
the death-bed of the purest patriot that ever perilled life in his coun- 
try's cause ; and let him witness a mighty people bowed down with 
sorrow, and mourning the bereavement of their friend, their father. 
And as the story shall proceed, that boy's cheek shall glow and his 
eye shall kindle with a noble enthusiasm, his heart shall beat with 
quicker pulse, and in his inmost soul shall he vow undying devotion 
to that country which, above all riches, possesses that priceless treas- 
ure, the name, the fame, and the memory of Washington. 

Nor is it here that the glorious results of your system of universal 
education for the people are to be arrested. The same wise Provi- 
dence which has bestowed on the inhabitant of the New World that 
restless activity and enterprise which so peculiarly adapt him for 
extending man's physical domain over the boundless forests, that still 
invite the axe of the pioneer, has also implanted in his breast a mind, 
searching, inquisitive, and acute; a mind that is yet destined to 
invade the domain of science, and to take possession of her proudest 
citadels. Hitherto, the absence of some basis of primary instruction 
has caused that mind, in a great degree, to run riot, for want of 
proper direction to its energies; but its very excesses serve but to 
prove its native strength, as a noxious vegetation proves, by the rank- 
ness of its growth, the fertility of the soil when yet unsubdued by 
man. Let this basis be supplied, and instead of indulging in visionary 
schemes, or submitting to the influence of the wildest fanaticism; 
instead of becoming the votary of a Mormon or a Miller, the freeman 
of America will seek other and nobler themes for the exercise of his 
intellect ; other and purer fountains will furnish the living waters at 
which to slake his thirst for knowledge. The boundless field of the 
arts and sciences will be opened to his view. Emulation will lend 
strength and energy to each rival in the race for fame. Then shall 
we have achieved the peaceful conquest of our second, our moral inde- 
pendence. Then shall we cease morally as well as physically to be 



134 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

the tributaries of the Old World. Then, in painting, other Wests and 
other Allstons will arise ; then sculpture will boast of other Green - 
ouo'hs and Powers ; then the name of Bowditch will not stand alone 
amongst the votaries of that science which has her home in the 
heavens; then other philosophers will take their place by the side of 
Franklin, and other divines will emulate the fame and follow in the 
footsteps of Channing. 



THE COURT A TEMPLE OF JUSTICE.* 

BY RANDELL HUNT. 

[Randell IIunt. a native of South Carolina, removed as a young man to New 
Orleans, where, in due time, he played an important part as lawyer and orator. He was 
an ardent Whig until the collapse of that party; and when the Civil War broke out he 
took an open stand in defence of the threatened Union. When Louisiana was to decide 
for herself, he was foremost among those who opposed the expediency of the Secession 
movement. In 18C>0 he was chosen United States Senator : but the seat was refused 
him on his arrival at Washington. In 1847-88 he was professor of Commercial Law. 
Constitutional Law, and the Law of Evidence, in the University of Louisiana (Tulane 
University). In 1867-84 he was, at the same time, President of the institution. He died 
March 22, 1892, in the eighty-fifth year of his age.] 

Educated under the wise and liberal institutions of a Republic of 
laws, I look upon the place in which I stand as a Temple of Justice — 
not as a theatre for a vain display of powers of disputation in personal 
rivalry. I regard this Court not as a weak assembly of individuals 
who can be easily operated upon and misled by the dictatorial spirit 
and arrogant airs of certain orators, who, forgetting that they are 
mere advocates, foolishly imagine themselves to be, and would make 
others believe them to be, the true and only oracles of the law ; but 
as an august tribunal, composed of men of good sense, firmness, integ- 
rity, and learning ; who, uninfluenced by any passion or prejudice, 
examine the questions properly submitted to them in a calm and 
patient spirit of investigation, and, after a full and impartial consider- 
ation, decide upon them, agreeably to the principles of law and justice. 

True liberty is a practical and substantial blessing. Its existence 
and its enjoyment depend upon principles which are equally important 
and should be equally dear to every man. These principles are founded 
in the laws, and are recognized, protected, and enforced under every 
social condition and civilized form of government. They are the safe- 
guards and guarantees of the most invaluable personal rights, of 
personal security, personal liberty, and the right of private property. 
In the case now about to be submitted, the last only of these rights 
is assailed. But this does not diminish the magnitude or interest of 
the cause itself ; for it would be vain to speak of any other right, if 
it be once authoritatively proclaimed that the acquisitions of labor 
shall no longer stimulate, cheer, comfort, and enrich industry, but shall 
* [Reprinted from The New Orleans Book (1851).] 



136 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

be the prize, or rather the prey, of unprincipled, reckless, and rapacious 
power. Such a proclamation would be a declaration of war against 
humanity and civilization — against those principles which the very 
savages hold sacred, as essential to the peace, safety, and harmony of 
society, and even to the support of individual existence. 

The secure enjoyment of property, under the supremacy of the 
laws, while it incites to industry and promotes enterprise in all the 
departments of labor, maintains and strengthens in the bosom of 
the citizen a sense of personal independence which is the foundation of 
human happiness, and enables him at once to discharge his obligations 
to his family, and to the community of which he is a member. This 
truth is so simple, so self-evident, that it is universally acknowledged, 
and even forms a part of the most despotic code. Napoleon himself, 
in the zenith of his power and glory, would not have dared to have 
laid violent and sacrilegious hands upon the property of the humblest 
subject of the empire. And what is the spectacle that is now pre- 
sented ? What could not be done under the despotism of a tyrant is 
audaciously attempted in this country of republican equality. A rich, 
unscrupulous, and greedy corporation has insolently appeared before 
this Court, and calls upon it to strip private individuals of their hard- 
earned property, the title to which is not only established and con- 
firmed by every principle of justice and by the special provisions of 
our own code, but by the uniform opinion and practice of the whole 
community, and the solemn decisions of our highest courts under the 
Spanish laws. 

To such a call this Court will not fail to give the stern rebuke of 
insulted justice. The jurisprudence of the State, so long settled, will 
remain under your action as fixed and stable as the eternal principles 
of truth and equity which form its basis, and the faith of the Court, 
solemnly pledged in its judgments, will continue to be the surest 
guarantee for the secure enjoyment of property purchased upon it. 
No licentious or disorganizing doctrine will be suffered to disturb, or 
in any manner to affect, the sacredness of a just title ; and the poorest 
citizen, while he betakes himself to repose under his humble shed, will 
reflect with pleasure and confidence that the fruits of his honest labors, 
under the protection of the laws of his country, are beyond the reach 
of the most unprincipled rapacity, though backed by wealth and acting 
under the high-sounding name of a Corporation. 



AGAINST THE POLICY OF IMPASSIVENESS.* 

BY PIERRE SOULE. 

[Pierre Soiile was born in Castillon, France, September, 1802. In 1825 he was 
detected in a plot against Louis XVIII. ; but being subsequently pardoned, he went to 
Paris where he studied law. While a writer on the staff of Le Nain Jaunt, his free 
expression of revolutionary principles offended Charles X. Paris was no place for the 
young enthusiast, and in 1826 he went first to Hayti, next to Baltimore, finally settling 
in New Orleans, where, after being admitted to the bar, he soon rose to distinction. In 
1845 he was elected to the State Senate, and in 1847 Governor Johnson appointed him 
United States Senator to fill a vacancy. In 1849 he was elected to that body for the full 
term. In all debates on national questions, he was a pronounced Southern man, and a 
leader of that wing of his party. In 1853 he was appointed Minister to Spain — a post 
which, in 1855, he resigned in consequence of his disappointment at the non-action of his 
government on the " Ostend Manifesto," which he had helped to frame. In the presi- 
dential campaigns of 1856 and 1860, he supported the claims of S. A. Douglas. Subse- 
quently, to the surprise of his friends, he declared himself an opponent to the secession 
of Louisiana. After the war, he resumed the practice of his profession in New Orleans. 
In 1868, with broken health, he finally retired to private life. Soule's fame as an orator 
is national. His addresses before the people were models of majestic and impassioned 
eloquence. He died in New Orleans, March 26, 1870.] 

Mr. President : Let us not be lulled into slumber by the idea that 
we are too distant from Europe to be affected by her political convul- 
sions. Do you not know that violence and oppression are contagious, 
and that their triumph in any point of time, or on any point of the 
globe, reacts on the moral world ? Why, moreover, speak of isolation, 
when you can ride your floating palaces from continent to continent 
in less time than it took your fathers, fifty years ago, to travel from 
Buffalo to New York, from Boston to Philadelphia? — when every 
wave of the ocean brings you swift messengers, blown over to these 
western shores by the same breeze that wafted them from the eastern 
hemisphere 8 — when, low as it beats, you can hear every pulsation of 
the European heart beneath the iron hands that strive to compress and 
stifle its languid and agonizing energies % 

But it is insisted that an expression of our sympathies is more a 
matter of sentiment than of right and policy. Sir, I pity the states- 
man who does not know that public sentiment, which sometimes sup- 
plies and sometimes corrects the law, is always its strongest support, 
And I believe that it is our duty to keep alive by good offices among the 

* [From a speech delivered in the Senate Chamber of the United States, March 12, 
1852.] 



138 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

nations of Europe that reverence for the institutions of our country, 
that devout faith in their efficacy, which looks to their promulgation 
throughout the world as to the great millennium which is to close long 
calendars of wrongs. Let their flame light up the gloom and dispel 
the darkness that now envelop the peoples of monarchical Europe. 
Humbled though these peoples be, do not despise them. It was not 
their choice, but treachery that made them slaves ; and if you should 
ask why is it that they seem to look with approving smiles and con- 
tented hearts to the hands that brandish the rod over them, do not 
forget those deluded wretches, condemned to be devoured by beasts 
for the entertainment of the Eoman Emperors, who could not be 
persuaded that Cassar was not Borne, and who, upon entering the 
Coliseum, as they passed his seat, would bow to him in respectful 
submission, and exclaim : " Caesar, morituri te salutant ! " (Ca?sar, 
though doomed to die we salute thee !) 

I heard, the other day, the honorable Senator from Tennessee, in 
one of those soul-stirring feats of eloquence so peculiarly his own, dis- 
claim that there be anything like destiny in the callings of a nation. 
How could he have thus overlooked that there is not a work of God's 
wisdom, nor a striving of the human intellect, that bears not the 
indelible seal of destiny % Onward ! onward ! is the injunction of 
God's will, as much as Ahead ! ahead ! is the aspiration of every 
American heart. We boast exultingly of our wisdom. Do we mean 
to hide it under the bushel, from fear that its light might set the 
world in flames ? As well might Christianity have been confined to 
the walls of a church, or to the enclosures of a cloister. What had it 
effected for mankind, what had it effected for itself, without the spirit 
that promulgated it to the world ? Onward ! onward ! To stand still 
is to be lifeless : inertion is death. Had Mahomet stood still, would 
he and the mountain have got together? Had the colonies failed to 
assert their rights, would this be the Government it is % Had Jeffer- 
son and Polk remained impassive, would Louisiana be ours? would 
Texas, would California, sit here in the bright garments of their 
sovereignty % 

You commend the policy of the fathers of the Republic, as if time, 
that withers the strength of man, did not " throw around him the 
ruins of his proudest monuments." Have I not shown how mutable 
it had been ? Let us not calumniate the past by fastening its usurpa- 
tions upon the future. I revere its teachings, but cannot submit to 
make them the measure of present wisdom. Speaking of the sages 
whose names and authority have so often been invoked in this debate, 
the elder Adams attempts to exculpate the defects of their views and 
policy by this remark : " The present actors on the stage have been 



AGAINST THE POLICY OF IMPASSIVENESS. 139 

too little prepared by their early views, and too much occupied with 
turbulent scenes, to do more than they have done." And with what 
ardent fervor and hope, with what enthusiasm, he speaks of the scenes 
which display themselves to his view in the future of his country ! 
" A prospect into futurity in America is like contemplating the heav- 
ens through the telescope of Herschel. Objects stupendous in their 
magnitude and motions strike us from all quarters and fill us with 
amazement!" 

My reverence for opinions consecrated by the authority of the 
sages who preceded us will not induce me to disintegrate this Repub- 
lic, and shear from its domain Louisiana, Texas, Florida, the Califor- 
nias, and New Mexico, because, forsooth, Washington, Adams, and 
Hamilton may have held that any accession of new territory to the 
area embraced by the old States was unconstitutional. I could not 
vote in favor of rechartering a national bank, because this institution 
had the assent of the same great men. Nor could I shut my ears, on 
their account, to those whisperings of the future that betoken the rising 
of new generations impatient to throw themselves on our lap. 

Sir, public opinion scorns the presumptuous thought that you can 
restrain this growing country within the narrow sphere of action origi- 
nally assigned to its nascent energies, and keep it eternally bound up in 
swaddles. As the infant grows, it requires a more substantial nour- 
ishment, a more active exercise. So the lusty appetite of its manhood 
would ill fare with what might satisfy the soberer demands of its 
youth. Do not, therefore, attempt to stop it on its onward career ; 
for as well might you command the sun not to break through the 
fleecy clouds that herald its advent in the horizon, or to shroud itself 
in gloom and darkness as it ascends the meridian. 



THE HIGHWAY OF NATIONS.* 



BY PIERRE SOULE. 



England has, from time out of mind, attempted to arrogate to 
herself the supremacy of the ocean. She once ruled it supreme. But 
the sceptre has fallen from her hands, and the tides have resumed 
their courses. And now, who dares to claim to be owner of the sea ? 
Who presumes to have exclusive right to its waves, to its currents, and 
to its storms ? 

" The earth," says the Psalmist, " was given to the children of men, 
but the sea is of God alone." Now, the idea of ownership implies 
that of exclusive possession, and, of consequence, not only the right of 
using the thing owned at will, but the right of excluding others from 
possession, and ofttimes the necessity of so excluding them in order 
that the possessor may reap all the advantages his property can yield. 
The sea has no characteristics that could constitute its ownership by 
any man or nation. Its immensity, its fluidity, must forever prevent 
its being subject to possession. It may be turned to profit, it is true, 
by each and by all of the human species, without its enjoyment by 
some impairing or diminishing its enjoyment by others. Its capacity 
is incommensurable, for there is no volume that can exhaust it. Thou- 
sands of fleets may be sunk in it to-day, and to-morrow it will again 
engulf millions of others, without ever being filled or notably com- 
pressed. There are no signs, no marks through which to attest its 
occupancy. Even those frightful, though majestic, leviathans that now 
plough it over in all directions, do not leave behind them any trace of 
their passage, since the rolling waves curl back as they move on, and 
waft away from its surface the last vestiges of their march. 

To make a thing yours by possession, you must possess in continu- 
ity the same thing. Identity in the thing owned constitutes one of 
the main elements of possession. A field or a forest may be upturned, 
altered, and transformed ; yet it will be the same field, the same for- 
est. Not so with the ocean, so unceasingly changing in its form, 
place, and surface ; now sinking its upper layers in the utmost recesses 
of the deep, now upheaving others from her lowest bed to the surface, 
as if to spread them to the light of Heaven in glorious exultancy. Its 
inexhaustibility renders its exclusive enjoyment not only useless, but 

* [From a speech delivered August 12, 1S52, in the Senate Chamber of the United States.] 



THE niGHWAY OF NATIONS. 141 

impossible. You may take from it for years and ages, with thousands 
and millions of men ; you may seize upon its pearls, its corals, its salts, 
and its fishes ; yet you only develop its powers of production and mul- 
tiply the yieldings of the mine from which you draw. By the decrees 
of God, the ocean is of all men. Nations may undertake to explain 
and interpret those decrees ; they cannot abrogate them. 

Yet, sir, nations have claimed ownership over it, or such a suprem- 
acy as seemed to constitute it in a sort of monarchy. They would 
have other nations call them the queens of the sea. Yes ; they claim 
to appropriate it to themselves and to subject it to their exclusive 
dominion. The discovery of America, and the vast development of 
commerce and navigation incident thereto, gave zest to and became a 
powerful stimulus for such assumptions. 

Thus, Venice arrogated to herself the Adriatic ; Genoa, the Ligu- 
rian Sea ; the Portuguese and the Spanish, the sea of the two Indies ; 
and in the eighteenth century, England claimed to be the mistress and 
sovereign of all the seas in communication with those surrounding her 
coast, which, of course, was no less than to claim sovereignty over all 
the seas in the world, as they all communicate with each other. But 
these arrogant assumptions on the part of powerful states never were 
assented to by those whom they excluded from the common domain. 
The history of England furnishes us with a striking example of her 
own susceptibility, whenever such claims were set up against her. At 
a time when, though powerful on the ocean, she could not yet pretend 
to rule her rivals out of it, and when Spain, in the palmiest days of 
her strength and glory, and aided by the bulls of the Pope, was claim- 
ing titles to all the lands and seas of the two Americas, the nations of 
this hemisphere sent ambassadors to the English court and loudly 
complained of the devastations which an illustrious navigator, Sir 
Francis Drake, was committing on her domains. Elizabeth, the super- 
cilious and unbending, in answering their complaints, said : 

" The use of the sea and of the air is common to all. No people 
nor private person can claim any power over the ocean ; for neither 
its nature nor its public usage will allow its being occupied." 

We find, it is true, in all ages, nations who, being more especially 
addicted to commerce and navigation, obtain, for a time, what the 
writers on the law of nations would call a, prepotency over the sea; 
but, even under that prepotency, they never pretended to be the sole 
tenants of it. Tyre, Rhodes, Athens, Laceda?mon, Carthage, and 
Pome herself never claimed its absolute and exclusive enjoyment, but 
suffered other nations to enjoy it with them. 

Though it was said of the Carthaginians that they exercised such 
a power over the sea as to render its navigation dangerous — adeo 



142 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

jpotentes mart, ut omnibvs utortalihus navigatio pericvlosa esset — yet 
they but aimed at a nominal supremacy ; and therefore it is that, 
according to Strabo, " they carried their commercial jealousy so far as 
to interdict the nations who contested with her for that supremacy 
from landing upon their coasts, and to sink all vessels with which her 
own met directing their course towards Sardinia, or towards what 
Avas called afterwards Gibraltar." 

I read in a most lucid and interesting treatise on the right of prop- 
erty, by Comte, that though the shores of the sea which formed part of 
the Roman Empire were considered the property of the Roman people, 
the use of them was held to be common to all mankind for fishing and 
navigable purposes ; and that though the authority of the pra?tor was 
necessary to warrant the construction thereon of any buildings, the 
want of such an authority did not involve the destruction of the 
works, if not injurious to fishing or navigation, or the cause of damage 
to others ; and the sole object of the authority required seems to have 
been to ascertain and establish the sovereignty of the Roman people 
over coasts which formed part of their territories. 

" The sea and its shores," says the Roman law, " are as common 
and free to all men as the air itself ; and no person can be prohibited 
from fishing in it." Accordingly, the Emperor Antoninus, to whom 
remonstrances were made against the inhabitants of the Cyclades, who 
interrupted the navigation of their neighbors, appropriately answered, 
" that he was the lord of the land ; but that law alone was sovereign 
over the sea." 

In more modern times, the Dutch gave a remarkable proof of 
their pertinacity to resist the claims of England over the immediate 
seas bordering on her coast ; albeit the treaty of 1654 is quoted as con- 
taining on the part of Holland a full acknowledgment of England's 
sovereignty over the sea. How impotent must the teachings of his- 
tory be, that such errors can obtain credit and be received as truth ! 
Holland had sustained a protracted and most disastrous war against 
England, and from impending exhaustion had agreed to the main con- 
dition of a treaty of peace as early as 1561. The Long Parliament 
insisted upon an article being inserted in the treaty by which Eng- 
land's sovereignty should be recognized and her flag saluted whenever 
it might appear on the high seas. This Holland bravely and peremp- 
torily refused. The war continued three years longer, and the treaty 
could not be signed, until the obnoxious clause had been stricken 
out, and another inserted in its place, granting the salute also, it 
is true, but as a mere mark of deference and courtesy alone. 

Thus, as it seems, the concurrence of mankind repelled all attempts 
at transforming the ocean into a thing manageable and compressible, 



THE HIGHWAY OF NATIONS. 143 

capable of being reduced to possession, and therefore susceptible of 
ownership. 

Now, the use of the ocean belongs to man and nations in so far 
only as it is being exercised. It is a right to such alone as exercise it, 
for the time they exercise it, and within the space over which it is 
exercised. As soon as it is abstained from, the right ceases— it is at 
an end — gone. " Cum igitur nil nisi usus maris et littorum occupari 
possit, facile constat jus hoc utendi tantum dictare quamdiu quis utitur 
et quatenus utitur." 

The ocean, therefore, is free. Yet will some say : May not its 
dominion be conferred from one nation to another — by all men to 
one '. It is clear that it cannot. Concede this, and what becomes of 
its freedom ? If its sovereignty can be conferred, it can be conquered : 
and, if so, it becomes at once the property of the first occupant or of 
the strongest. Force, in the one case, will be as legitimate as injustice 
in the other. Even its enjoyment could not be of one man and of one 
nation, without all other nations and men renouncing the right which 
nature has given equally to them all. 

But this is no longer insisted upon. It has grown obsolete ; it is 
not as much as thought of, unless, indeed, it be by some incorrigible 
tyro of the school of Selden, or some fanatic and blind admirer of 
every dictum that ever fell from the fertile pen of Grotius. 



IMPORTANT PUBLIC SERVICES OF HENRY CLAY* 

BY THEODORE H. M'CALEB. 

[Theodore Howard M'Cai-eb was born in Pendleton District, S. C, February 10, 
1810. He was educated at Phillips Exeter Academy and at Yale College. In 1832 he 
settled in New Orleans, and was, in due course, admitted to the Louisiana bar. In 1846 
President Polk appointed him United States District Judge of Louisiana. This position 
he held until the secession of the State. He was for three years president of the Univer- 
sity of Louisiana, and for almost seventeen years professor of International and Admiralty 
law in the same institution. He died at Hermitage Plantation, Miss., April 29, 1804.] 

But it is rather as citizens of the Union that we love to dwell upon 
the services of Mr. Clay. We love to recur to that dark period in our 
history, made glorious by American valor arfd American genius ; a 
period when the Republic was called upon to vindicate her honor 
against wrongs committed upon her commerce by England and 
France, under the Berlin and Milan decrees, and the British orders 
in council. Under the pretext of prosecuting legitimate hostilities in 
pursuance of these retaliatory measures, the most atrocious depreda- 
tions were committed by both nations upon our neutral trade. And 
while France was induced by our stern remonstrances to abandon her 
unjust and abominable policy, so far at least as it related to American 
vessels, England continued to persevere in her course of arrogance and 
oppression, until an indignant people demanded vengeance for her un- 
provoked hostilities upon the property of our merchants, and for her 
barbarous impressment of our mariners while pursuing their peaceful 
avocations upon the highway of nations. 

This important crisis in our affairs occurred in 1811, during the 
administration of Mr. Madison. Mr. Clay was then a member of the 
House of Representatives, and had been elected its presiding officer. 
The mind of the amiable President was inclined to peace, though he 
afterwards proved firm when his resolution was once taken. A pacific 
policy was also recommended by Mr. Gallatin, then at the head of the 
Treasury Department. Against every measure tending to a declara- 
tion of hostilities were arrayed the powerful talents of Mr. Randolph, 
of Virginia, and Mr. Quincy, of Massachusetts. It is not difficult, 
however, to imagine what would be the conduct of Mr. Clay in such 
an emergency. Like the Antaeus of ancient fable, he rose with renewed 
and redoubled vigor, under the Herculean pressure of opposition that 

* [From an oration delivered in Odd Fellows' Hall, New Orleans, December 9, 1852.] 



IMPORTANT PUBLIC SERVICES OF HENRY CLAY. 145 

attempted to bear him to the earth. He was then in the prime of 
life, " with the rose of heaven upon his cheek, and the fire of liberty 
in his eye." He saw that there was but one course to be pursued 
for the vindication of the insulted honor of the country, and for a 
prompt and effectual redress of her accumulated wrongs— and that 
course involved a declaration of war. He advocated the embargo 
laws, because the measure was a direct precursor to war ; he advocated 
the increase of the army and navy, and every other measure that 
would lead to the declaration of hostilities. Side by side with Mr. 
Calhoun he nobly sustained the honor of the country. High above 
their compeers shone these two young and gallant champions of the 
Eepublic— the Tancred and Rinaldo of political chivalry. The con- 
duct of Mr. Clay on that memorable occasion cannot, perhaps, be 
better described than by adopting the language of a member of Con- 
gress, who was a personal witness of the effect of his eloquence upon 
the crowds who daily hung upon his thrilling accents. " On this oc- 
casion," said he, " Mr. Clay was a flame of fire. He had now brought 
Congress to the verge of what he conceived a war for liberty and 
honor, and his voice rang through the Capitol like a trumpet-tone 
sounding for the onset. On the subject of the policy of the embargo, 
his eloquence, like a Macedonian phalanx, bore down all opposition, 
and he put to shame those of his opponents who flouted the Govern- 
ment on being unprepared for war." 

His great object was finally accomplished. War was declared. 
The military and naval resources of the country were called into 
requisition, and both on the land and on the ocean the honor of the 
country was gloriously sustained. 

In consequence of the friendly interposition of the Emperor Alex- 
ander of Russia, a willingness was expressed by the Ministry of Eng- 
land to negotiate with our Government a treaty of peace. Mr. Clay 
and Mr. Eussell were appointed by Mr. Madison, Commissioners for 
this purpose, and accordingly Mr. Clay, on the 19th of Januarv, IS 1-1, 
resigned his station as Speaker of the House of Representatives, and 
proceeded on his mission to Ghent. He was there joined by Messrs. 
Adams, Gallatin, and Bayard, who had left St. Petersburg and repaired 
to the place appointed for the meeting of the Commissioners, for the 
purpose of aiding in the arrangement of the terms of peace. The 
treaty was signed in December, 1814. Afterwards a commercial con- 
vention, highly advantageous to the trade and navigation of the coun- 
try, was concluded in London by three of the Commissioners of Ghent; 
viz., Messrs. Adams, Clay, and Gallatin. 

The public career of Mr. Clay was subsequently distinguished by 
the able, eloquent, and untiring support he gave to' the cause of Inter- 
10 



146 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

nal Improvement, and to the protection of Domestic Industry. Let 
the mere sectional politician say what he may, these measures were 
absolutely necessary to enable the country to develop with rapidity 
her great natural resources, and to secure her independence of the 
manufactories of Europe. Those who would properly appreciate the 
services of Mr. Clay must look to the situation of the country while 
she was yet young and in a comparatively feeble state ; and not to 
her present prosperous position, with her great facilities for inter- 
national communication, and for prompt and rapid transportation 
from State to State ; nor to her splendid manufactories, which are soon 
destined not only to rival, but to surpass establishments of the same 
character in the Old World. Nor should we limit our inquiry to the 
condition of the country in time of peace ; but Ave should view the 
subject as the great statesman himself was accustomed to view it, 
with reference to the contingency of war, and to those calamities 
which war must inevitably entail upon every great commercial nation. 
What would be the condition of our country without manufactures, 
and without the facilities of transportation from one part of the Union 
to the other, for cannon and other munitions of war, while the fleets 
of a powerful enemy are sweeping the ocean, and prowling along our 
coasts ? The policy of Mr. Clay demanded the aid of Government for 
the prosecution of what individual resources and individual energy in 
the earlier period of our history were inadequate to accomplish. He 
aimed at the security of our commercial independence, and of our 
internal prosperity, at all times, and in every emergency. 

With the zeal displayed by our great champion of universal liberty 
in the cause of South American and Grecian independence, you are 
all familiar. His speech in support of his proposition to send a min- 
ister to the United Provinces of the Rio de la Plata is one of the ablest 
and most elaborate arguments which emanated from the illustrious 
statesman during his whole public career. It is full of historical 
information and statistical details, and evinces by its laborious research 
the deep, heartfelt anxiety of its author to secure for the colonies the 
encouragement of our own Government, in the establishment of that 
political independence for which they were nobly contending. His 
speech in support of Mr. Webster's proposition to send a commissioner 
to Greece is a short but gallant appeal in behalf of a people in whose 
favor the sympathies of every humane heart would be naturally en- 
listed. There cannot be presented to the imagination of a friend of 
liberty a spectacle grander and more imposing than was exhibited in 
the Congress of our Eepublic, when Clay and Webster, the great ora- 
tors of America, stood forth the undaunted advocates of the restora- 
tion of freedom to the land of Pericles and Demosthenes. 



IMPORTANT PUBLIC SERVICES OF HENRY CLAY. 147 

The exertions of Mr. Clay in behalf of both South America and 
Greece were zealously continued during the time he was at the head 
of the Department of State under the administration of Mr. Adams ; 
and with what success we shall presently have occasion to notice. 

As a diplomatist, his abilities were displayed to the greatest 
advantage. In the negotiations which led to the Treaty of Ghent, he 
wielded " the pen of a ready writer ; " while his excellent judgment, 
great prudence, and practical intelligence rendered him at all times an 
efficient coadjutor and a safe councillor of his distinguished associates 
in the commission. He not only aided in bringing to an honorable 
close the war of 1812, but subsequently also, in conjunction with 
Messrs. Adams and Gallatin, as we have already seen, in securing by 
the Commercial Convention signed in London, on the 3d of July, 
1815, those reciprocal advantages for our commerce and navigation, 
which proved to be so effectual in enabling our enterprising mer- 
chants to recover from the paralyzing consequences of the war. 
His easy and conciliatory deportment, his perfect freedom from all 
duplicity, and from that mysterious, enigmatical style of conducting 
diplomatic conferences, once so common at the different courts of 
Europe, gained for him the respect and confidence of the English 
negotiators. 

The prudence and wisdom of Mr. Madison were never more hap- 
pily displayed than in the appointment of the members of the Com- 
mission to adjust our difficulties with Great Britain. There was 
Adams, learned on all subjects, and fortified by a thorough knowl- 
edge of international law ; there was Gallatin, ready in all financial 
details, and familiar with the commerce of the globe ; and there was 
Clay, bearing the reputation of an orator of rare abilities, quick to 
discover an advantage, and prompt in turning it to the interest of his 
cause, ever active, ever vigilant, looking alike to the present honor 
and ultimate prosperity of the country. Such an array of talent and 
ability could not fail to exert a favorable impression on the diploma- 
tists of the proud nation before whom the rights of our young Repub- 
lic were to be vindicated, and her high character maintained. It 
formed an appropriate sequel to the gallant exploits of our Army and 
Navy. England learned, for the first time, that she was neither the 
mistress of the ocean, nor the undisputed arbiter of nations ; that we 
not only possessed a power to check her progress upon the land and 
upon the ocean, but also a moral and intellectual ability to teach her 
the great and immutable principles of international justice. 

It has been truly said that the diplomacy of our country was never 
more efficiently conducted than during the time our foreign relations 
were committed to Mr. Clay. The number of treaties he negotiated 



148 SPECI3IENS OF ORATORY. 

while at the head of the Department of State, was greater than all 
that had been previously concluded there, from the adoption of the 
Constitution.* He concluded and signed treaties with Colombia and 
Central America, with Denmark, Prussia, and the Hanseatic League. 
He also effected a negotiation with Russia for the settlement of the 
claims of American citizens, and concluded a treaty with Austria, but 
left the Department before it was signed. His letters to Mr. Gallatin, 
while the latter was our Minister at London, upon the subject of our 
trade with the British colonies, and the navigation of the St. Law- 
rence, have ever been regarded as documents of rare value in the 
history of our negotiations, and have deservedly placed the writer 
among the most accomplished diplomatists of the age. Another state 
paper, which has probably gained him more reputation than all others 
which have emanated from his pen, is his letter of instructions to the 
Delegation to the Congress of Panama. But that which will in all 
time secure to his memory the veneration of every ardent lover of 
liberty is his successful appeal to the Emperor of Russia, through our 
Minister at St. Petersburg (Mr. Middleton), to contribute his exertions 
towards terminating the war which was then raging between Spain 
and her South American colonies. He was equally successful in 
obtaining the acquiescence of the same great power in the recognition 
of the independence of Greece. His strenuous exertions while he was 
Secretary of State, in connection with the noble efforts previously 
made by himself and Mr. Webster, upon the proposition of the latter 
to send a commissioner to Greece, were mainly instrumental in excit- 
ing the sympathies of Europe in favor of the struggling people of that 
ancient home of freedom ; and in securing to them a recognition of 
those constitutional guarantees for the protection of their rights under 
a limited monarchy, for which they had long contended. And now, 
in the musical strains of Whittier : 

,l The Grecian as he feeds his flocks 
In Terajie's vale, on Morea's rocks, 
Or where the gleam of bright blue waters 
Is caught by Scio's white-armed daughters, 
While dwelling on the dubious strife 
Which ushered in his nation's life, 
Shall mingle in his grateful lay 
Bozzaris with the name of Clay." 

* Life of Mr. Clay, by Epes Sargent. 



COLLEGIATE EDUCATION. 



BY CHRISTIAN KOSELIUS. 



[Christian Roselius was born August 10, 1803, in Theddinghausen, Brunswick, 
Germany. At the age of sixteen, he left his native land for New Orleans on board the 
bark Jupiter ; and his indigent condition compelled him, in payment of his passage, to 
pledge his services for a few years after his arrival in port. His contract of apprentice- 
ship he carried out to the letter, and some time afterwards established and edited The 
Halcyon. In 1823 he was admitted to the Louisiana bar, and about eight years later 
was appointed AttorneyTGeneral of the State. It was during his term in that office that 
Daniel Webster invited him to become his law partner in Washington ; but Roselius, 
out of love for life in New Orleans, declined the invitation. He was for many years 
Dean of the University of Louisiana, and for the last twenty-three years of his life was 
Professor of Civil Law in the Law Department of that institution. His lectures on the 
Civil Code of Louisiana, his opinions as Attorney-General, and his briefs as an advocate 
before the courts, display a lucid reasoning and grasp of the law, at once profound and 
philosophic. He died in New Orleans, September 5, 1873.] 

The question has been sneeringly asked, Of what practical benefit 
is the knowledge of Greek and Latin, and the higher branches of 
mathematics, to those who do not intend to enter the learned profes- 
sions ? Persons who propound such questions seem to have lost sight 
of the fact, that the great and paramount object of education is the 
development and strengthening of the powers of the mind, and that 
that important end can only be attained by exercising and disciplining 
the mental faculties. Now, every one who has bestowed the least 
consideration on the subject must know that nothing is better calcu- 
lated to fix the attention, and to induce thought and reflection, than 
the study of the dead languages and the mathematics. Indeed, it is 
obvious that not one step can be taken in these studies without bring- 
ing nearly all the mental powers into active operation. It is therefore 
manifest that, without insisting, for the present, at all on the manifold 
other advantages resulting from a proficiency in classic literature, and 
the mathematical and natural sciences, the study of these branches of 
knowledge is, at any rate, of incalculable benefit as the means of 
accomplishing the great end of education — the improvement of the 
mind. 

It is said that Wisdom does not speak to her followers in Latin, 
* [Reprinted from Ross's Southern Speaker (1856).] 



150 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

Greek, and Hebrew only, but that she teaches her sublime lessons in 
the pages of Shakespeare, Milton, Jeremy Taylor, and a brilliant con- 
stellation of other authors, who have all written in our own nervous 
vernacular. This is true. But let me ask, What class of readers nour- 
ish their minds with the strong, healthy, and invigorating food set 
before them by these writers \ Certainly not those whose taste has 
been cloyed, and whose powers of digestion have been enfeebled, if 
not entirely destroyed, by feeding on the pap and sweetmeats of most 
of the popular authors of the day. Not one reader in a thousand who 
pores with delight over the glittering inanities of Bulwer, or the vapid 
sentimentalities of James, will ever venture to read a hundred lines of 
the Paradise Lost or a single scene of Hamlet. There is a craving 
and insatiable appetite for novelty, which is constantly increased by the 
trash it feeds on. How can this mental malady be cured, unless it be 
by forming the taste and judgment of the youthful student by a care- 
ful study and contemplation of the great models of antiquity ? In 
them alone do we find that wonderful artistic perfection which the 
moderns have attempted to imitate in vain. Homer as a poet, Demos- 
thenes as an orator, and Thucydides as an historian, still stand, each 
in his own department, in solitary grandeur, unrivalled and unapproach- 
able. " The poems of Homer," says Dr. Johnson, " we yet know not 
to transcend the common limits of human intelligence, but by remark- 
ing; that nation after nation, and century after century, has been able 
to do little more than transpose his incidents, new name his characters, 
and paraphrase his sentiments." 

Keference is frequently made, by those who take the opposite view 
of this subject, to instances of what are called self-made men, for the 
purpose of proving that a liberal education is not an essential requisite 
for the attainment of intellectual distinction. We are told that the 
Bard of Avon " had little Latin, and less Greek ; " that Kobert Burns 
was a peasant ; that Pope was the best Greek scholar of his age, and 
has translated the sublime poetry of Homer into English, with all the 
vigor and freshness of the original, yet he never was inside of a col- 
lege. All this is true ; and other examples might be added to the list. 
But, allow me to ask, What does this prove against the correctness 
of the propositions which we have been endeavoring to establish? 
There are exceptions to all general rules, and one of the most familiar 
maxims of logic is, that the exception proves the rule. Now, that we 
meet occasionally with a mind so happily organized, and endowed with 
such a degree of energy and will, as to grapple successfully with the 
disadvantages of a neglected or stinted education, and " climb the steep 
where Fame's proud temple shines afar," does surely not prove any- 
thing against the benefits and necessity of collegiate instruction and 



COLLEGIATE EDUCATION. 151 

discipline. Besides, who can tell, except those that have gone through 
the ordeal, by what privation, labor, and application such persons 
have been enabled to travel over the rugged paths to knowledge, and 
thereby provide something like a substitute for early and regular 
training ? And how many have ever been successful in the attempt ? 
Not one in ten thousand. 



EFFECTS OF IGNOKANCE AMONG THE MASSES.* 

BY CHRISTIAN KOSELIITS. 

What are the amusements of the ignorant ? They must necessarily 
consist, and be limited, in a great measure, to the gratification of the 
sensual appetites, the inevitable consequences of an abuse of which are 
a debilitated body and a depraved heart. Nearly all the avenues to 
the higher enjoyments of the soul are closed up to the ignorant ; they 
look with a vacant stare at the wonderful and beautiful works of an 
all-wise Creator ; their eyes cannot understandingly behold the admir- 
able harmony of nature ; nay, the greatest of all blessings vouchsafed 
to man — the inestimable comforts and consolations of religion — can- 
not be enjoyed and appreciated by them to the same extent as those 
whose mental faculties and moral perceptions have been awakened 
and' sharpened by education and religious training. And yet we hear 
intelligent persons talk of the danger of over-educating the people. 
Let me ask, What would become of our liberty, our admirable system 
of government, and our glorious Union, if it was not for the education 
and intelligence of the people ? Destroy these, and the beautiful 
fabric will crumble into dust, and like "an insubstantial pageant 
faded, leave not a rack behind." Look at the pages of history ; and 
by whose instrumentality has human freedom been invariably crushed, 
and despotism and oppression established in its place ? By the igno- 
rant masses of the people, led on by designing and unscrupulous 
demagogues. 

Take, as an illustration of this position, the last French revolution, 
or, as it is called, the coup cVetat of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte. Here 
we see the president of a republic, elected by his fellow-citizens, sworn 
to support that constitution from which alone he derived his power, 
deliberately commit perjury, murder, and treason, and thereby consti- 
tute himself the master of the very people whose servant he had been ; 
and the stupid populace shout, and assist in riveting the chains by 
which they are enslaved. Would any President of the United States, 
however daring and ambitious he might be, ever dream of such an act 
of usurpation, even if he had an army of five hundred thousand 

* [Reprinted from Ross's Southern Speaker (1856).] 



EFFECTS OF IGNORANCE AMONQ THE MASSES. 153 

soldiers at his command? Certainly not; for he would know that 
the majority of the people who had elevated him to the highest office 
in their gift are too well educated and too intelligent to be made tools 
of in his hands for the destruction of their own freedom ; that, under- 
standing and appreciating their liberty, the first act of usurpation 
would be visited by the most condign punishment, not by the assassin's 
dagger, but by the awful decree of the violated majesty of the law. 



ON THE QUESTION OF THE ANNEXATION OF CUBA 
TO THE UNITED STATES.* 



BY JUDAH P. BENJAMIN. 



Mr. President, there is one paramount principle affecting this 
whole question of annexation, which our self-respect requires us to 
present prominently before the world. It is, that in the expansion of 
our system, we seek no conquest, subjugate no people, impose our laws 
on no unwilling subjects. When new territory is brought under our 
jurisdiction, the inhabitants are admitted to all the rights of self-gov- 
ernment. Let no attempt be made to confuse this subject by the use 
of inappropriate terms. It is the fallacy lurking under the use of the 
word " belongs," of which despots make use. Cuba " belongs " to 
Spain. True. But in what sense? NeAV York "belongs" to the 
United States, also ; but in what sense ? 

Cuba is subject to Spanish sovereignty. Her people now owe alle- 
giance to Spain ; but the island does not belong to Spain as property 
belongs to an individual. The Cubans are not the property of the 
Crown. Nay, the soil of the island belongs to private proprietors. 
The right of Spain, as a proprietary right, extends only to the public 
places on the island not disposed of to private individuals, and to such 
revenues as she can lawfully and legitimately exact from her subjects. 
But, sir, from the date of our independence, we have had fixed princi- 
ples on the subject of the true proprietorship of countries. The fun- 
damental theory of our Government is, that the people of all countries 
are the true and only owners ; that governments are established for 
their benefit ; and that whenever governments become subversive of 
the true ends of their institution, it is the right of the people to alter 
and abolish them. The island of Cuba belongs, not to Queen Isabella, 
but to the people who inhabit it, and who alone have the right to 
decide under what government they choose to live. 

Now, Mr. President, I desire to say, in a few words, what my view 
is in relation to the policy of this country. I would propose, as the 
President proposes, the purchase of the island of Cuba from the gov- 
ernment of Spain. If that be refused, if it be supposed that Spanish 
pride or Spanish dignity is involved in the proposition to such an 

* [ From a speech delivered in the Senate Chamber of the United States, February 
12, 1859.] 



THE ANNEXATION OF CUBA TO THE UNITED STATES. 155 

extent as to make it impossible for them to cede it, I would then say 
to Spain : " If you will not cede the island to us, grant independence 
to your subjects there, and we will pay you a reasonable equivalent 
for the abandonment of your revenues, and make settlement hereafter 
with the people of Cuba for our advances/' 

If this offer be again refused, then let us announce to Spain in 
advance, that whenever opportunity shall occur we are ready and 
resolute to offer to the people of Cuba the same aid that England 
offered to the other Spanish colonies ; the same alliance, offensive and 
defensive, which France so nobly tendered to us in the hour of our 
darkest peril. Tell her that Ave shall repair the wrong by us done to 
the generation now passing away in Cuba when we impeded their 
efforts for gaining their independence, by affording to the present gen- 
eration our aid, countenance, and assistance. Tell her that, when the 
Cubans shall have conquered their independence, theirs shall be the 
right of remaining a separate republic, if they so prefer ; that we will 
cherish, aid, and protect them from all foreign interference, and will 
draw close the bonds of a mutual, social, and commercial intercourse, 
that shall be of incalculable benefit to both. Tell her, too, that if the' 
people of the island, with their independence once acquired, and repub- 
lican institutions established, shall desire to unite themselves with us, 
they shall be admitted to the equal benefits which our system of gov- 
ernment secures to each independent State that enters into its charmed 
circle. She shall unite with us freely, the equal associate of free 
States ; and when the union shall have been accomplished, the sword 
of the nation shall smite down any rude hand that shall attempt to 
sunder those whom the God of freedom has united. 



NEGKOES AS PKOPEKTY * 



BY JUDAH P. BENJAMIN. 



[Me. President :] The Senator from Yermont [Mr. Collamer] 
repeats what I deem the legal heresy of saying that slaves are not prop- 
erty. I had, some twelve or eighteen months ago, a debate with the 
honorable Senator from Yermont on that subject, and I do not mean 
to repeat what was then said any further than I can avoid ; but upon 
that occasion I assumed to show that, from the time negroes were 
first known in Europe and America, up to the time that Lord Mans- 
field made his decision in the Sommersett case, they never had existed 
except as slaves. I showed that they were treated as slaves, as a 
matter of course, by all the continental nations of Europe, not only at 
home, but were forced as such upon the colonies ; I showed that there 
was no law declaring them to be slaves, but they were treated as 
such by the open and common consent of mankind ; not merely 
by the tacit consent of the people of England, thus giving origin to 
the common law, bat by the consent of mankind. I showed 
that negroes existed in England, and were bought and sold in the 
market. 

If Senators will look at a number of the Tatler, for the year 1702 
I think it is, they will find a complaint of the negro Pompey, ad- 
dressed to Steele, who wrote the article, in which Pompey complains 
that his silver collar is not as pretty a one as his mistress gives her 
dog. The negro slaves were not only held and sold in the English 
marts, but they had collars around their necks and were treated as 
animals, and complaint made that they were not treated as well as 
dogs. If you will look to the London Advertiser of the year 1751, 
you will find the advertisement of a goldsmith's apprentice, recom- 
mending himself to the nobility of London as being exceedingly expert 
in making collars for dogs and blacks. They were unknown in any 
other capacity than that of menial servants, subject to the wills of 
their masters. According to the admission in the Sommersett case 
itself, there Avere then fourteen to seventeen thousand slaves in Eng- 
land, bought and sold at the Exchange. They are treated in English 
* [From a speech delivered in the Senate Chamber of the United States, March 9, I860.] 



NEGROES AS PROPERTY. 157 

Acts of Parliament as merchandise in so many words. They were 
treated by Sir Philip York, according to the gentleman's own authority, 
as merchandise, as chattels, many years before Lord Mansfield made 
his decision ; and then, when you take up Lord Mansfield's decision, 
what is it ? What is the distinction there made ? Just the distinction 
that the fanatics of the North are now making in favor of the blacks 
against the whites. Lord Mansfield said that although slavery was 
known to and established by the common law of England, it was only 
white slavery that was so known ; and because in those ancient times, 
beyond which the memory of man runneth not, there existed no blacks 
who could be slaves, he held that by the common law of England 
African negroes were not slaves, although white Saxons were. I 
defy any man to extract anything else from that decision than just 
what I have stated. It was admitted by the counsel on both sides, 
admitted by the judge himself in delivering his decision, that the 
white Saxon was a slave by the common law of England, and it was 
held that the African savage, brought from remote countries into 
England, was not a slave, because he had not been known to the 
common law as a slave. 

It was because of this decision, which was merely yielded up to the 
spirit of fanaticism, then as rampant in England as it is now in our 
Northern and Eastern States — it was in relation to this decision that 
Lord Stowell spoke of Lord Mansfield's having delivered a stump 
speech, or something equivalent to that, instead of a decision in the 
Sommersett case. In the case of the slave Grace he declared that 
negroes were slaves in the colonies, not by virtue of statute, but by 
use and custom, which are the sole origin of the common law ; and 
whether you choose to speak of the technical common law as it pre- 
vails in England, or of that enlarged definition of common law which 
considers it as the rules based on reason and justice, and growing into 
the authority of law by the common use of mankind — whether y< >u 
speak of it in the one light or the other, certainly you can find no 
period on this continent when the negro was not a slave, and you can 
find no statute making him so. They never became so by statute law. 
How did they ever become so at all ? There was no statute law in 
these colonies reducing them to slavery. 

I passed a word the other day with the Senator from Massachusetts 
(Mr. Wilson), . . . as to the ground upon which the Indians became 
slaves to the Puritan fathers. Talk to me of the absence of com- 
mon law on this subject ; the common law which acknowledged your 
equals — the white Saxon race — to be slaves to the Norman lords, sub- 
ject to barter, subject to purchase and sale, unable to transmit their 
inheritance to their children, in every sense of the word slaves, just as 



158 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

the modern negro is a slave in the Southern States, though, because 
negroes had not yet been introduced into England, Lord Mansfield 
had the judicial hardihood to hold that the white Saxon was a slave 
by the common law, and that the African savage was not. He was 
rebuked by Lord Stowell for it in a judgment which is a model of 
judicial clearness and perspicacity. That was not the only case. Did 
not the English Court of King's Bench give a judgment in favor of 
the Spanish owner of slaves which had been taken by an English 
ship on the high seas I On what ground ? If negroes were not 
slaves except by virtue of municipal law, which is the modern heresy, 
if they were not slaves outside of the limits of the place in which 
the law bound them down as slaves, on what principle was it that 
the English Court of King's Bench gave a decree for the payment 
of the Spanish owner of the slaves taken and seized by an English 
frigate '. 

Mr. President, it is too late for us to continue discussions of this 
kind. They are, after all, mere legal curiosities — mere antiquarian 
researches. Enough for us to know that that which we claim as prop- 
erty is recognized as such by the Constitution of the United States; 
that it has the sanction of the fathers ; that it lies at the foundation 
of the compact by which we formed a common government ; and 
that, without the fullest recognition and protection of that prop- 
erty, this Government never could have originated. It is not now, in 
the year 1860, that we are to be driven back to an examination of 
the origin from which our rights are derived, or the true basis upon 
which they rest. We treat these questions as no longer open. We 
treat our rights as conceded in this Government ; and, treating 
these rights as conceded, we announce, we have announced, we con- 
tinue to announce, that the Union under which we live is valuable to 
us only so long as it is governed by the Constitution to which we 
consented ; that if you change that Constitution, you subvert that 
Union. In that sense, and in that alone, have you a right to speak of 
the people of the South as disunionists ; and in that sense you may 
count them all as disunionists, for I know not a man at the South who 
is not willing to give up this Union rather than give up the Constitu- 
tion, which is the basis upon which it was formed. We fight to pre- 
serve the Constitution, and, in so fighting, fight to preserve the Union. 
We consider those the true disunionists who lay an unhallowed hand 
on the ark of the covenant, and try to desecrate it to our loss and dis- 
honor. Respect it, keep your unholy hands off it, leave it as it was 
left by the fathers, and you have brethren ready, shoulder to shoulder 
and side by side with you, to fight in its support. Desecrate it, pollute 
it, destroy our rights under it, invade the sanctuary with your modern 



NEGROES AS PROPERTY. 159 

ideas in relation to the free rights of man, to the equality of races, to 
amalgamation, to polygamy, and all the isms that unfortunately pre- 
vail amongst certain classes at the North— prevail with these ideas, 
break down the Constitution, make your ideas the governing principle 
by which this country is to be administered, and I say to you, and 
every Southern man that I know says, that if the Constitution perish, 
perish the Union with it. 



THE CONFEDERATE SEAL.* 

BY THOMAS J. SEMMES. 

[Thomas Jenkins Semmes was born at Georgetown, D. C, December 16, 1824. He 
was graduated, first at Georgetown College with the degree of A. B., then at the Harvard 
Law School with the degree of LL.B. He practised law in Washington City about five 
years before removing to New Orleans to engage in the same profession. He has held 
many political offices in Louisiana, and represented that State, with General Sparrow, in 
the Confederate Senate. From 1873 to 1879 he occupied the chair of Civil Law in the 
University of Louisiana. In 188G he was elected, for the ensuing year. President of the 
American Bar Association. A writer in Jewell's Crescent City says: "In the subtle 
game of law, Mr. Semmes is as adroit as a practical general in the field. When he gets 
into his subject and is warmed with it, he utters words of fire that carry the listener 
captive along with him. He is renowned for his ability to sway courts by a logic almost 
irresistible, and juries by a fascinating eloquence. He is called by some of our lawyers 
' The Incarnation of Logic' "] 

Mr. President: I am instructed by the Committee to move to 
strike out the words duce vincemus in the motto and insert in lieu 
thereof the words vindlce majores mmulamur — " Under the guidance 
and protection of God we endeavor to equal, and even to excel, our 
ancestors." Before discussing the proposed change in the motto, 
I will submit to the Senate a few remarks as to the device on the seal. 

The Committee have been greatly exercised on this subject, and 
it has been extremely difficult to come to any satisfactory conclusion. 
This is a difficulty, however, incident to the subject, and all that we 
have to do is to avoid what Visconti calls " an absurdity in bronze." 

The equestrian statue of Washington has been selected in deference 
to the current of popular sentiment. The equestrian figure impressed 
on our seal will be regarded by those skilled in glyptics as to a cer- 
tain extent indicative of our origin. It is a most remarkable fact, 
that an equestrian figure constituted the seal of Great Britain from 
the time of Edward the Confessor down to the reign of George III., 
except during the short interval of the protectorate of Cromwell, 
when the trial of the king was substituted for the man on horseback. 
Even Cromwell retained the equestrian figure on the seal of Scotland, 
but he characteristically mounted himself on the horse. In the reign of 

* [Speech delivered in the Confederate Senate, April 27, 18G4, on the orator's motion 
to strike out the words " seal of," and substitute for the words " Deo duce vincemus" 
the legend " Deo vindice majores remulamur."] 



THE CONFEDERATE SEAL. 161 

William and Mary, the seal bore the impress of the king and queen 
both mounted on horseback. 

Washington has been selected as the emblem for our shield, as a 
type of our ancestors — in his character of prmoeps mmorum. In 
addition to this, the equestrian figure is consecrated in the hearts of 
our people by the local circumstance that, on the gloomy and stormy 
22d of February, 1862, our Permanent Government was set in motion 
by the inauguration of President Davis under the shadow of the statue 
of Washington. 

The Committee are dissatisfied with the motto on the seal as 
proposed by the House resolution. The motto proposed is as follows : 
" Deo Duce Yincemus " — " Under the leadership of God we will 
conquer." 

The word duce is too pagan in its signification, and is degrad- 
ing to God because it reduces him to the leader of an army ; for 
scarcely does the word duce escape the lips before the imagination 
suggests exercitus, an army for a leader to command. It degrades 
the Christian God to the level of pagan gods, goddesses, and heroes, 
as is manifest from the following quotation : " Nil desperandum 
Teucro duce." This word duce is particularly objectionable because 
of its connection with the word vincemus — " we will conquer." This 
connection makes God the leader of a physical army, by means of 
which we will conquer, not must conquer. If God be our leader, we 
/// ust conquer, or he would not be the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, 
and of Jacob, nor the God of the Christian. This very doubt implied 
in the word vincemus so qualifies the omnipotence of the God who 
is to be our " leader," that it imparts a degrading signification to the 
word duce in its relation to the attributes of the Deity. 

The word vincemus is equally objectionable, because it implies 
that the war is to be our normal state ; besides, it is in the future 
tense — " we will conquer." The future is always uncertain, and there- 
fore it implies doubt. What becomes of our motto when we shall 
have conquered ? The future becomes an accomplished fact, and our 
motto thus loses its significance. In addition to this, there are only 
two languages in which the words " will " and " shall " are to be found 
— the English and the German — and in those they are used to qualify 
a positive condition of the mind and render it uncertain; they are 
repugnant to repose, quiet, absolute and positive existence. 

As to the motto proposed by us, we concur with the House in 
accepting the word Deo — God. We do so in conformity to the 
expressed wishes of the framers of our Constitution, and the senti- 
ments of the people and of the army. 

The preamble of the Provisional Constitution declares that " We, 
11 



162 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

the deputies of the sovereign and independent States of South Caro- 
lina," etc., " in voking the favor and guidance of Almighty God, do 
ordain," etc. In this respect both our Constitutions have deviated in 
the most emphatic manner from the spirit that presided over the 
construction of the Constitution of the United States, which is silent 
on the subject of the Deity. 

Having discarded the word duce the committee endeavored to 
select in lieu of it a word more in consonance with the attributes of 
the Deity, and therefore more imposing and significant. They think 
success has crowned their efforts in the selection of the word vindex 
which signifies an asserter, a defender, protector, deliverer, liberator, 
a mediator, and a ruler or guardian, as may be seen from the follow- 
ing examples : First, a defender : " Habet sane populus tabellam 
quasi vindicem libertatis." — Livy. (The people hold a bond, the 
defender, as it were, of their liberty.) Second, a protector: "Vin- 
dicem periculi Curium res suppeditat." — Livy. (The circumstances 
suggest or afford Curius as a protector against danger.) Third, a 
mediator : " Nee Deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus incident." — 
Horace, Ars Poetica. (Let not God intervene, unless the catastrophe 
be worthy of such a mediator or interposer.) Fourth, rider or 
guardian: "Vindicem eum regni reliquit." — Justin's History. (He 
left him ruler or gtcardian of the kingdom.) 

Vindex also means an avenger or punisher. First, " Furias vin- 
dices facinorum." — Cicero. (The Furies the avengers of crime.) 
Second, " Me vindicem conjurationis oderunt." — Cicero. (They hate 
me, the punisher of their conspiracy.) 

No word appeared grander, more expressive or significant than 
this. Under God as the asserter of our rights, the defender of our 
liberties, our protector against danger, our mediator, our ruler and 
guardian, and as the avenger of our wrongs and the punisher of our 
crimes, we endeavor to equal or even excel our ancestors. What word 
can be suggested of more power, and so replete with sentiments and 
thoughts consonant with our idea of the omnipotence and justice of 
God? 

At this point the Committee hesitated whether it were necessary 
to add anything further to the motto " Deo vindice.' 1 These words 
alone were sufficient and impressive, and in the spirit of the lapidary 
style of composition were elliptical and left much to the play of the 
imagination. Eeflection, however, induced us to add the words 
majores cemidamur, because without them there would be nothing in 
the motto referring to the equestrian figure of Washington. It was 
thought best to insert something elucidative or adoptive of the idea 
intended to be conveyed by that figure. Having determined on this 



THE CONFEDERATE SEAL. 163 

point, the Committee submit to the judgment of the Senate the words 
majores cBimdam ur, as best adapted to express the ideas of " our ances- 
tors." Patres was first suggested, but abandoned because majores 
signifies ancestors absolutely, and is also more suggestive than jxitres. 
The latter is a term applied to our immediate progenitors who may 
be alive, whereas majores conveys the idea of a more remote genera- 
tion that has passed away. 

This distinction is well marked in the following quotation from 
Cicero against Caecilius: "Patres, majoresque nostri." (Our fathers 
and forefathers.) 

That being disposed of, the question arose as to the proper signifi- 
cation of the word amulamur. Honorable emulation is the primary 
signification of the word ; in its secondary sense, it is true, it includes 
the idea of improper rivalry, or jealousy. But it is used in its primary 
and honorable sense by the most approved authors, as may be seen 
from the following examples : First, " Quoniam amiulari non licet 
nunc mvides."— Plautus, The Boastful Soldier. (Since you cannot 
equal, you now envy him.) Second, « Omnes ejus instituta laudare 
facilms possunt quam amiidari."— Cicero. (It is easier to praise than 
to equal his precepts.) Third, « Pindarum quisquis studet Eemulari," 
etc.— Horace, Odes. (Whoever endeavors to equal Pindarus is sure 
to fall.) Fourth, " Virtutes majorum aemulari."— Tacitus, Life of 
Agncola. (To equal, to come up to the virtues of our ancestors ) 
This last example is an exact application of the word in the manner 
proposed by the Committee. 

The secondary and improper sense of the word cemulari is excluded 
in the proposed motto by the relation it bears to " Deo vindice " 
This relation excludes the ideas of envy or jealousy, because God as 
the asserter of what is right, justifies the emulation, and as a punisher 
of what is wrong, checks the excess, in case the emulation runs into 
improper envy or jealousy. In adopting the equestrian figure of 
Washington, the Committee desire distinctly to disavow any recog- 
nition of the embodiment of the idea of the " Cavalier." We have no 
admiration for the character of the « Cavalier " of 1640, any more than 
for that of his opponent the Puritan. We turn with disgust from 
the violent and licentious Cavalier, and we abhor the acerb, morose 
and fanatic Puritan of whom Oliver Cromwell was the type In 
speaking of Cromwell and his character, Guizot says « that he pos- 
sessed the faculty of lying at need with an inexhaustible and unhesi- 
tating hardihood, which struck even his enemies with surprise and 
embarrassment." This characteristic seems to have been transmitted 
to the descendants of the Pilgrims who settled in Massachusetts Bay 
to enjoy the liberty of persecution. If the Cavalier is to carry us back 



164 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

to days earlier than the American Revolution, I prefer to be trans- 
ported in imagination to the field of Runnymede, when the Barons 
extorted Magna Charta from the unwilling John. But I discard all 
reference to the Cavalier of old, because it implies a division of society 
into two orders, an idea inconsistent with Confederate institutions. 

The Committee have discharged their duty and submit the result 
to the consideration of the Senate. 

It is true they have labored more than a year, and critics may say, 
" Parturiunt montes, nascitur ridiculus mus." 

^Esthetical critics, who claim to be versed in glyptics, have, how- 
ever, failed to suggest anything better. If the proposition be not 
satisfactory to the Senate, it is hoped the matter will be intrusted to 
other and more learned hands. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON AND ROBERT E. LEE * 

BY BENJAMIN M. PALMER. 

[Benjamin Morgan Palmer was born in Charleston, S. C, January 25, 1818. In 
1838, after he was graduated from the University of Georgia, he entered upon the study 
of Divinity in the Theological Seminary at Columbia, S. C. In 1841 he was licensed by 
the Presbytery of Charleston to preach the Gospel. Having married in the same year, 
and being soon after ordained, he took charge of the First Presbyterian Church in 
Savannah, Ga. In 1842 he was transferred to a pastoral charge at Columbia, S. C, and 
remained with this church for fourteen years. During the most of this period he rilled 
the chair of Church History and Government in the Theological School in the same city. 
In 1852 Oglethorpe University conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Divinity; 
and in 1870 Westminster (Mo.) College followed with that of LL.D. It was in 1856 
that he began his life-work with the First Presbyterian Church of New Orleans, where 
he has won for himself the love and reverence of every citizen, irrespective of creed, 
race, or grade. He wrote The Life of James Henley lliornipett (1875). Mr. John Dimitry 
says: " Through the essential goodness of Dr. Palmer human sin has often been lifted 
into hope ; through his wonderful words human rebellion has as often been shamed into 
conviction. In the pulpit he appears like one of the old prophets, with a message to 
deliver. It is difficult, indeed, to resist the magnetism of his discourse, so stately in 
speech, so fervid in imagination, so vivid in pictures, so scholarly in illustrations, so 
spontaneous in gesture, and so supreme in faith. To possess such an orator is a privi- 
lege for the generation which he honors, and for the city in which his voice has been so 
long heard in behalf of every good cause."] 

What is that combination of influences, partly physical, partly 
intellectual, but somewhat more moral, which should make a particu- 
lar country productive of men great over all others on earth, and to 
all ages of time ? Ancient Greece, with her indented coast, inviting 
to maritime adventures, from her earliest period was the mother of 
heroes in war, of poets in song, of sculptors and artists, and stands up 
after the lapse of centuries the educator of mankind, living in the 
grandeur of her works and in the immortal productions of minds 
which modern civilization, with all its cultivation and refinement and 
science, never surpassed and scarcely equalled. And why, in the 
three hundred years of American history, it should be given to the 
Old Dominion to be the grandmother, not only of States, but of 
the men by whom States and empires are formed, it might be curious, 
were it possible for us, to inquire. Unquestionably, Mr. President, 
there is in this problem the element of race ; for he is blind to all the 
truths of history, to all the revelations of the past, who does not 

* [From an address delivered at a meeting of the citizens of New Orleans, October 
15, 1870, the funeral day of General Robert E. Lee.] 



106 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

recognize a select race as we recognize a select individual of a race, to 
make all history. But pretermitting all speculation of that sort, when 
Virginia unfolds the scroll of her immortal sons — not because illustri- 
ous men did not precede him gathering in constellations and clusters, 
but because the name shines out through those constellations and 
clusters in all its peerless grandeur — we read first the name of George 
Washington. And then, Mr. President, after the interval of three- 
quarters of a century, when your jealous eye has ranged down the 
record and traced the names that history will never let die, you come 
to the name — the only name in all the annals of history that can be 
named in the perilous connection — of Robert E. Lee, the second Wash- 
ington. Well may old Virginia be proud of her twin sons ! born 
almost a century apart, but shining like those binary stars which open 
their glory and shed their splendor on the darkness of the world. 

Sir, it is not an artifice of rhetoric which suggests this parallel 
between two great names in American history ; for the suggestion 
springs spontaneously to every mind, and men scarcely speak of Lee 
without thinking of a mysterious connection that binds the two 
together. They were alike in the presage of their early history — the 
history of their boyhood. Both earnest, grave, studious ; both alike 
in that peculiar purity which belongs only to a noble boy, and which 
makes him a brave and noble man, filling the page of a history spot- 
less until closed in death ; alike in that commanding presence which 
seems to be the signature of Heaven, sometimes placed on a great 
soul when to that soul is given a fit dwelling-place ; alike in that 
noble carriage and commanding dignit}^, exercising a mesmeric influ- 
ence and a hidden power which could not be repressed upon all who 
came within its charm ; alike in the remarkable combination and 
symmetry of their intellectual attributes, all brought up to the same 
equal level, no faculty of the mind overlapping any other — all so equal, 
so well developed, the judgment, the reason, the memory, the fancy, 
that you are almost disposed to deny them greatness, because no 
single attribute of the mind was projected upon itself, just as objects 
appear sometimes smaller to the eye from the exact symmetry and 
beauty of their proportions ; alike, above all, in that soul-greatness, 
that Christian virtue to which so beautiful a tribute has been paid by 
my friend,* whose high privilege it was to be a compeer and comrade 
with the immortal dead, although in another department and sphere ; 
and yet, Mr. President, in their external fortune so strangely dis- 
similar — the one the representative and the agent of a stupendous 
revolution, which it pleased Heaven to bless, and thereby give birth 
to one of the mightiest nations on the globe ; the other the representa- 

* [Hon. Thomas J. Serames, who was the first speaker on the occasion.] 



GEORGE WASHINGTON AND ROBERT E. LEE. 167 

tive and agent of a similar revolution, upon which it pleased high 
Heaven to throw the darkness of its frown ; so that, bearing upon his 
generous heart the weight of this crushed cause, he was at length 
overwhelmed ; and the nation, whom he led in battle, gathers with 
spontaneity of grief over all this land, which is ploughed with graves 
and reddened with blood, and the tears of a widowed nation in her 
bereavement are shed over his honored grave. 



THE END OF SECTIONALISM * 

BY E. JOHN ELLIS. 

[Ezekiel John Ellis was born in Covington, La., October 15, 1841. He served in 
the Confederate army, first as a private, tihen as a captain. In 1866 he was admitted to 
the New Orleans bar. In 1874 he was elected to Congress, and secured reelection in 
1876, 1878, 1880, and 1882. He died in Washington, D. C, April 19, 1889. The late 
James G. Blaine once said : "Ellis, of Louisiana, is one of the most eloquent and 
earnest debaters I have ever heard." ] 

More than sixty years ago, the dread gulf of sectionalism yawned 
by the very altar of our country. No matter, now, whose was the 
fault. It appeared, it grew, it widened. It brought hatreds, and 
strifes, and threats, and bitterness, and drew away the hearts of 
Americans from the love and the trust of the fathers. In vain did 
heroes bleed, in vain did sages warn. Finally, there came war ; and 
over and into this gulf, Americans fought, and the blood of Ameri- 
cans, shed by American hands, was poured. A million of noble lives 
were offered up. Women wept their husbands, and children mourned 
their fathers, and yet the gulf would not close. And since the strife 
and the bloodshed, the gulf has remained until now. To-day, thank 
God, it is closed ! 

The warm outburst of sympathy and love that broke from the 
great heart of the South for the stricken President, who was their 
enemy in Avar, and whose political course and theories in peace were 
with those who seemed against the prejudices and sympathies of the 
South, has touched the generous heart of the mighty North as it has 
not been touched before. In the gloom of the common grief, the sec- 
tions see each other as they have not seen before ; and over the suffer- 
ing couch, and around the tear-moistened grave of the martyred Pres- 
ident, they have met and realized, with the old love of our fathers 
warm in their sad hearts, that they are one — one in love, in hope, in 
sympathy, and destiny forever. And so the gulf of sectionalism closes 
upon the sacred form of the dead President. God grant that the sacri- 
fice may prove enough ! God of our fathers, grant that the Union, 
thus recemented, may grow stronger and stronger as the years roll on, 
and live, a quickening and animating presence, in the heart of every 
American. And if this shall be so, then will James A. Garfield's 
death have accomplished what his life was powerless to achieve, 
though he wielded the soldier's sword and wrote the statesman's law. 

*[From an address delivered, September 26, 1881, on the occasion of the funeral 
obsequies in honor of President James Abram Garfield.] 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY.* 

BY RANDALL L. GIBSON. 

[Randall Lee Gibson was born at Spring Hill, Woodford County, Ky., September 
10, 1832. In 1853 he took his A. B. degree from Yale College, and about two years after 
was graduated from the Law Department of the University of Louisiana. He served with 
honor in the Confederate Army (1861-65), attaining the rank of major-general before the 
close of the war. Always a sterling Democrat, in 1872 he was elected to Congress from 
the First Congressional District of Louisiana, but was not allowed to take his seat. He 
was reelected to the position in 1874, 1876, 1878, and 1880. On the organization of 
Tulane University he was made President of its Board of Administrators. From March 
4, 1883, until his death, which occurred December 15, 1892, he was United States 
Senator from Louisiana.] 

Mr. Speaker : The Spaniards discovered the Mississippi River. In 
1528, a century before the French reached its upper tributaries, or the 
English landed at Jamestown, Cabeza de Vaca passed near the mouth 
of the great river, but his vessel was tossed away by the strong cur- 
rent, aided by a wind from the east ; yet he and his companions first 
tasted and remembered " its sweet waters." Another gallant Spaniard, 
Ferdinand de Soto, who had been the companion of Pizarro in the con- 
quest of Peru, with a band of faithful followers, courtiers and artisans, 
priests and soldiers, like Cortez, bidding adieu to his ships, penetrated 
the southern forests, and after three years of adventurous wanderings, 
full of hard struggles and bitter disappointments, in the spring of the 
year 1541 first planted the banners of Spain and of the Christian Church 
upon the banks of the Mississippi River, beneath whose turbid waves 
he found a grave for himself, his ambitions, and his hopes. 

More than a century after this — a century and a half — in 1673, the 
meek and illustrious Father Marquette, the brave chief Joliet, and 
Father Hennepin, entered the Valley of the Mississippi. The latter 
explored it northward nearly to its headwaters, and the former navi- 
gated it with fearless intrepidity as far south as the Arkansas. 

But brilliant as these exploits were, they have not obscured the 
lustre that surrounds the name of La Salle, for it was his happy fortune 
to excel all his predecessors in the boldness and the extent of his 
wonderful and successful discoveries. Baffled by no disappointments, 
surmounting all obstacles by his own indomitable will, and supplying 

* [Speech delivered in the House of Representatives of the United States, March 7, 
1882.] 



170 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

all deficiencies from the resources of his own matchless genius, the 
equal of Ctesar in fixedness of purpose, and not inferior to Columbus 
in self-reliance, without supplies or equipments, attended by a band of 
compatriots few in number but equally ardent in the bold and hazard- 
ous enterprise, these heroic Frenchmen, coining into the valley by way 
of the northern lakes, embarked upon the great river, not knowing 
whither they might be borne by its majestic and ceaseless current, 
until at length, having mastered the perils of hostile tribes and the still 
greater perils of the treacherous and relentless floods, on the sixth day 
of April, 1682, they were greeted by the sight of the dancing white 
caps, and they heard the soft murmurs of the southern sea. 

With loyal and pious hearts, at the head of the passes near the 
mouth of the river, in acknowledgment of their successful discovery, 
on the 9th of April, 1082, they erected a cross and a column, on which 
were affixed the arms of France, around which they chanted a hymn 
that from the seventh century was heard in lonely cloisters, in stately 
cathedrals, and in ever}^ land and on every sea, from the lips of the 
zealous and holy missionaries of the Christian Church sent forth to the 
remotest ends of the earth, inspiring the children of the Christian 
faith with kindling fervor and the sacrifice of self in the work of the 
Divine Master : 

" The banners of Heaven's King advance, 
The mystery of the Cross shine forth." 

La Salle afterward returned to France to fit out an expedition to 
enter the Mississippi River by way of the Gulf of Mexico, but by mis- 
take entered Matagorda Bay in Texas and took possession of the 
country in the name of his king, and thus Texas became properly a 
part of that vast empire that under the name of Louisiana in a later 
age was added to the dominions of the Republic. Born in Rouen, 
France, it was his destiny to have his life terminated, stricken down 
by conspirators among his own followers, in the prime of manhood, at 
the age of forty-three, in the midst of his greatest achievements on the 
banks of the Trinity, while on his way from Texas to Canada, still in 
search of " the fatal river." 

It is proposed on the 9th of April to commemorate the two hun- 
dredth anniversary of his achievements, to celebrate the memory of 
La Salle, the discoverer of the Ohio and the Mississippi, whose genius 
consecrated to king and Church, and opened to settlement and civiliza- 
tion, a territory that to-day embraces two-thirds of our Republic and 
over twenty-five million of our population. What spot more appro- 
priate for such a celebration than the head of the passes near the 
mouth of the river where he and his compatriots first raised the 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. 171 

emblems of their faith and country, and left the memorials of their 
successful achievements ? There the celebration will be held. There 
will be reenacted the scene performed by the great Frenchman and his 
followers. 

But how changed the conditions, the circumstances, and the times ! 
It will be a celebration by the millions who inhabit the great valley 
heirs of his labors, citizens of free and enlightened commonwealths 1 
coequal parts of a mighty confederacy, born one hundred years after 
his discoveries, but already one of the foremost nations of the earth in 
the magnitude of her dominions, in wealth, power, and population ; in 
the arts and sciences and letters ; in manners and morals ; in all the 
resources of civilization ; in the stability and freedom of her institu- 
tions, and in the intelligence, the genius, and the affections of her 
citizens. 

Orators fitly chosen will recite the virtues of the great Pioneer- 
how he was fashioned on the model of Homer's heroes, of Achillean 
temper. 

" Impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis, acer." 

How he breasted famine, disease, and disappointment, the fury of 
man and of the elements, the southern heat and the rigors of the frozen 
north ; how with an enthusiasm surpassing that which beat beneath 
the impenetrable mail of Eichard the Lion-hearted, he ever pressed 
onward, over ocean, lake, and river, among cruel and savage foes in 
the trackless wilderness, to discover the great West, and to endow 
America with the richest jewels in her diadem. 



GKACE IN WOMAN.* 

• BY BENJAMIN M. PALMER. 

But, young ladies, . . . you must not only be competent to meet 
the engagements of the future, but you must discharge them with the 
elegance or grace which is the queenly trait of a high womanly career. 
All the offices she is called to fill require her to be adorned with this 
beautiful halo. She is the chief element in the refinement and culture 
of a people, and becomes of necessity the chief exponent of a true 
civilization. Her position in the social scale indicates, as with the pre- 
cision of an electrometer, the degree of sensibility and taste which has 
been reached by the community at large. For this she needs to be 
clothed with grace as with a robe of honor. She is at once the orna- 
ment and centre of the domestic circle. Her presence lights the fire 
upon every hearth-stone ; and her genial presidency, like the soft 
radiance of the moon, diffuses contentment and peace over the home. 
The ungraceful woman, who elbows her Avay with a sort of angular 
awkwardness through life, may be the moon still, but the moon as she 
veils her face behind the clouds, shedding but a smothered light and 
only saving the world from total darkness. 

The woman too is the world's chief comforter. It is hers to still 
the sob of the orphan, and to cheer the desolate heart of the widow ; 
hers to brush away the falling tear, and to hold the drooping head ; 
hers to wipe the death-damp from the brow, and with plaintive dirge 
to sing the weary soul to rest. What refinement of feeling and grace 
of action do not these holy offices of sympathy and affection require I 

These illustrations will suffice to show that I do not employ the 
term grace in any technical and narrow sense, as equivalent only to 
the mannerism of the fashionable world. Kest assured there is a. 
world-wide difference between the fine lady of fashion and the true- 
hearted woman in the full development of that nature given her of 
God ; and the starched elegance of the one is no more the free dignity 
of the other than is galvanized copper the pure coin which has stood 
the test of the mint. The grace for which I plead does not reside in 
postures and gestures, to be measured by lines and angles ; but it is 
that free carriage of body and soul with which a cultivated woman 

* [From an address delivered to the first graduates of the H. Sophie Newcomb 
Memorial College, of New Orleans, in College Chapel, June 17, 1889.] 



GRACE IN WOMAN. 173 

sweeps on through the commonest duties of life. It is the queenly 
deportment, as conspicuous amidst the embarrassments of poverty as 
amidst the blandishments of wealth. For its attainment, a refined 
sensibility and an improved taste are just as essential as a sound 
judgment and a true heart. There must be the quick discernment of 
the beautiful and the true, a ready command of the emotions inspired 
by both, and the facility of expressing these in appropriate acts. The 
best illustration of this is furnished in the distinction drawn by that 
acute metaphysician, Dr. Brown, between the artificial politeness of 
society and the true politeness of intellectual and moral culture, when 
he defines the latter as nothing more than " knowledge of the human 
mind directing general benevolence." " It is," says he, " the art of 
producing the greatest happiness which, in the mere external courte- 
sies of life, can be produced by raising such ideas or other feelings in 
the minds of those with whom we are conversant as will afford the 
most pleasure, and averting, as much as possible, every idea which may 
lead to pain. It implies, therefore, when perfect, a fine knowledge of 
the natural series of thoughts, so as to distinguish not merely the 
thought which will be the immediate or near effect of what is said or 
done, but those which will arise still more remotely ; and he is the 
most successful in this art of giving happiness who sees the future at 
the furthest distance." Dr. Brown proceeds to illustrate this distinc- 
tion from the lower orders of society, the most tender of whom have, 
as he expresses it, " little foresight of the mere pains of thought," and 
" whose benevolence, so far from fulfilling its real wishes, becomes 
itself the most cruel of tortures."* 

To the cultivation of grace in this enlarged sense of the term 
politeness, all the branches of your education have here been directed ; 
not only those heavier studies which strengthen the reason and inform 
the mind, but those lighter accomplishments intended to refine the 
taste and to polish the enamel of character itself. A cold utilitarian- 
ism might ask, Why this expenditure of time and money in acquiring 
mere accomplishments which can seldom form the staple of dut}^, for 
the easel and the note-book will soon be pushed aside by the ruder 
employments of life ? It is sufficient to reply, that these accomplish- 
ments, if they have not displaced more important studies, form no 
unimportant part of woman's education. You have been taught music 
and drawing not merely that you may sing and paint, but that these 
polished studies may impart their sweet grace to your character, and 
that you may be through life more elegant women, by the delicacy of 
thought and feeling which they are suited to inspire. 

* Philosophy of the Human Mind, Vol. 1, pp. 39, 40. 



CHIVALRY* 

BY EMMANUEL DE LA MOKINIEEE. 

[Emmanuel de la Moriniere was born in Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, April 17, 1856. 
About 1867 his family settled in New Orleans, and he was placed in the Jesuits' College 
of that city. In 1873 he joined the Society of Jesus, and spent the early part of his 
religious career at Grand Coteau, La., where the Jesuit Mission of New Orleans had 
then a novitiate. Since he was ordained priest his life has been chiefly passed with the 
members of his order in New Orleans. He is one of the most elegant pulpit orators 
of the South. His delivery is charming, and his language is forcible, vigorous, and 
picturesque.] 

To the performance of their duties did the knights of old bind 
their loyal, heroic hearts, and so gladly and enthusiastically, that in 
earliest time, and before even Christianity had become the very core 
of chivalry, and the Church had flung over its warriors' panoply the 
mantle of a three-fold consecration, for them 

" Labor in the path of duty 
Gleamed up like a thing of beauty." 

And the standard of it was high ; none higher among all the ideals 
of human conduct. The respect and obedience paid by the young to 
the old, the essential meaning of which was education for the one 
part and self -discipline for the other ; the modesty of mien, pure aims, 
and high morality of the young knights ; the courtesy and protection 
granted to women ; the loyalty which was as the substance of honor, 
and the honor which was as the very life of a man's soul ; the horror 
of falsehood ; the thoroughness of the training in moral purity and 
physical prowess, and the splendor of the results in certain characters 
and achievements — all make the noblest chapter of history. 

No wonder that Edmund Burke should have exclaimed in one 
of the grandest outbursts of his fervid eloquence : " Chivalry is the 
unbought grace of life, the cheap defence of nations, the nurse of 
manly sentiment and heroic enterprise ; " and that, deploring its loss 
as a social institution, a military organization, the test of propriety, 
and the guide of manners in the higher ranks of society all over 
Europe, he should have let fall from his lips the most pathetic dirge 
that could be sung over its fall. " Nevermore," he says, " shall we 
behold that generous loyalty to rank and sex ; that proud submission ; 

* [From a lecture delivered at Odd Fellows Hall, New Orleans, April 5, 1893.] 



CHIVALRY. 175 

that dignified obedience ; that subordination of the heart, which kept 
alive even in servitude itself the spirit of an exalted freedom ; that 
sensibility of principle ; that chastity of honor, which felt a stain like 
a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated ferocity, which 
ennobled whatever it touched." 

Lest my words to you to-night prove little more than the mere 
rehearsing of an oft-told tale, hearkened to patiently and at the dawn 
forgotten, I must bid you linger awhile on that sense of duty visible, 
at every turn, in the wonderful fabric of chivalry, and ruling the 
brains, and firing the hearts, and nerving the arms of its men of iron, 
in the discharge of their trust at the hour of peril. 

When Wellington, setting foot on Portuguese soil, simply said, 
" I came here to perform my duty," he had given utterance to what 
gives bone and marrow to every deed of true valor. Indeed, if we 
were only roused to action by the prospect of immediate gratification 
and the pressure of immediate pain, virtue alike and enterprise were 
at an end. 

We see it daily and hourly in those in whom that feeling is faint 
or extinguished. Their views are short and indistinct ; their hopes 
and wishes grovelling ; their actions without vigor ; their energies 
paralyzed by a sullen and indolent content. 

And if you ask me why families decay, why dynasties crumble, 
why the world is shaken from central stone to hinge by periodical 
revolutions, I will tell you it is because men have made a mock of 
that word duty ; because they have torn from the gospel of practical 
life that page in which it is written that rational obedience to duty is 
the very essence of highest civilized life, its strongest bulwark, its 
only hope of perpetuity. We have not in our power to be crowned 
kings in the proud realms of wealth, or in the prouder realms of intel- 
lect. The singular inward gifts and outward circumstances which 
form the well-spring of such boasted royalty are within reach only 
of the select few ; but all, all, from enthroned monarch to lowliest 
toiler, have it in their power to stamp their deed of hand with the 
seal of duty. 

Despite the hot-headed theorists, styling war the eternal need of 
human kind ; despite the calmer verdict of sober minds, that 

"War is honorable 
In those who do their native right maintain, 
In those whose swords an iron barrier are 
Between the lawless spoiler and the weak," 

I own my natural weakness. Like Byron's "Doge of Venice," I have 
not yet learned to think of indiscriminate murder without "some 



176 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

sense of shuddering." When the grim monster's blood-shot eye glares 
upon me from the pages of history, past or contemporary, I mark it 
at once as the proof and scourge of man's fallen state. 

Yet, young gentlemen that listen to me to-night, I am not blinded 
to the fact, that though reared amid scenes of flourishing peace, 
though not wedded to the profession of arms by irrevocable choice, 
though the pursuit of business claims your round of days and com- 
mands your energies, still you are soldiers, every one of you : nay, 
more, you are sons and brothers to the bravest men that ever girt 
sword or shouldered musket ; to the noblest heroes that ever fought, 
bled, died, in the cause of patriotism or the defence of liberty ; to the 
most knightly warriors that cannon signal or trumpet flourish ever 
summoned to bloody fields ; to men whose spirits never faltered, whose 
hearts never quailed, whose cheeks never blanched, whose resolve 
never wavered, whose courage never failed, through four bitter years 
of recurring failure ; to men whose self-sacrifice and indomitable ardor 
have no parallel in the history of any nation. Greater in their defeat, 
a thousand times greater than they might have been in triumph, the 
boys in gray have taught a conquering foe from the banks of the 
Potomac to the headwaters of the St. Lawrence, and from Gettysburg 
to Florida, that the fields drenched with their young blood, and torn 
by their untimely agony, can never be lost fields so long as the word 
honor retains its meaning in the lexicon of human speech. 

Not in bitterness have I spoken these words, O my friends ! Nor 
with animus or revengeful design, Heaven knows! For the day is 
past, irretrievably past, and we bless the God of peace for the boon, 
when the gleaming blades that so proudly hang at your sides on occa- 
sions might be made to leap from their scabbards, to flash in the sun 
of civil broils, and sheathe themselves in the warm hearts of those 
who, like yourselves, were born in the Union of States. 

In brotherly love we now clasp each other's hands across the dark 
chasm of an unfortunate past. We own allegiance to a united coun- 
try, since the angels of God have stolen the bitterness of defeat from 
the beaten, and the memory of victory from the conquerors. 

" The hands of slain men have soldered the rift ; " and in the soul- 
stirring words of the Bishop of Wilmington, addressed to the mem- 
bers of the Grand Army of the Republic on Decoration Day, not a 
month ago : " By a miracle of American patriotism, the riven heart- 
strings of a nation have again been welded so firm and strong that no 
future tension can ever force them to snap asunder. North and South 
have clasped hands in an undying friendship." 

Why, then, have I awakened to-night the slumbering echoes of 
by-gone days ? Ah, you know why ! That you might grave them on 



CHIVALRY. 177 

the tablets of your hearts ; that you might bind them like shields about 
your necks ; that you might be reminded by them to what achieve- 
ments you are heirs ; and that great deeds are to be worked for, 
bled for, died for, to-day as in the days of Gettysburg, Richmond, and 
Shiloh ; that though war be the dreadful thing and scourge it was 
meant to be, you might be pardoned for thinking one crowded hour of 
glorious life is worth an age without a name, and for wishing that 
your brilliant uniforms might be more than a mere parade dress, and 
your good swords better than glittering toys ; but especially to give 
point to my assertion that loyal adherence to duty was the true cheva- 
lier's first and engrossing care. 

Self-reverence or self-respect is the most powerful and one of 
the most useful of our mental habits. It is the principle to which 
the noblest actions of our nature may be most frequently traced ; the 
nurse of every splendid and every useful quality. How far it may be 
occasionally abused is a question which has long been disputed with 
fanatical acrimony. Every human feeling is liable to imperfection ; 
nor can it be considered a subject of blame, that even our best institu- 
tions are only a chance of evils. 

A sense of honor, in its widest meaning, includes the faculty of 
forming some ideal standard superior to the lower nature of man and 
recognizing in ourselves some power of approximating to it. The 
higher the standard the nobler will be the man who cherishes it and 
tries to attain to it, but it is by no means a rare gift confined to a few 
select natures. On the contrary, it is the commonest and most uni- 
versal incentive to good conduct. Even in the rudest and simplest 
form of admiration for physical courage, it makes heroes of many a 
common sailor or soldier. It makes a hero of the ship captain who 
dies with his passengers and leans over the gunwale to give the part- 
ing boat its course, and who, though conscious that his name shall 
never be heard above the wash of the fatal waves, still goes down 
quietly to his grave, rather than break his faith to those few emi- 
grants. It makes a hero of the poor country clown who, fresh from 
the plough-tail, stands firm and undismayed in the shattered squares of 
Waterloo or on the bloody ridge of Inkermann, because he has been 
brought up in the fixed idea that a Briton must never run from a 
Frenchman or a Russian. 

But from those common and universal forms of self-reverence we 
rise, step by step, to the higher ideals, which give us among gifted 
natures what may be called "the salt of the earth," the shining- 
examples which guide the world to higher things. Bayard, " fearless 
and unblamedj" bleeds to death amid the ruins of France, because he 
scorns the help and compassion of the rebel Bourbon. Sidney, dying 
12 



178 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

on the fields of Zutpken, instead of quenching his own intolerable 
thirst, hands over the cup of water to the wounded sentinel, because 
his soul, nourished on noble thoughts, and his fancy fed on the old 
ballads which, like that of " Chevy Chase," stirred him like a trumpet 
blast, had led him to conceive the ideal of a perfect knight, which 
would have been tarnished by any shade of a selfish action. Gordon 
sacrifices his life at Khartoum not only cheerfully, but almost instinc- 
tively, because the suggestion that he might save himself by abandon- 
ing those who had trusted in him seems an absolute impossibility. 

The grand figure of Lee towers above all others in the history of 
our own times and of our own country, and will tower still higher 
when future races of American historians shall record its stirring 
events with impartiality, because the great Virginian forsook home, 
fortune, a certain future, all — in his endeavor to choose what was 
right. Indeed, the creative hand of God cannot fashion a nobler 
heart than that which takes such a motto for the shaping of its 
ways ; nor can history record a nobler life than that in which the 
actual deed is in keeping with such a guiding principle. 

It has been my good fortune to live in terms of close religious 
intimacy with a veteran chaplain* who served our gallant bands 
during those days of trying warfare. From that day in April, 1861, 
when the first shot was fired at Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor, 
to that day in April, 1865, when the heroic struggle ended by the 
surrender of Lee's army at Appomattox Courthouse, in Virginia, his 
priestly zeal had ministered to our troops. He had shared their 
exultation in the flitting hours of success. He had cheered their 
drooping spirits and roused their energies in the brief hours of dark 
despondency ; and whether in closed ambulance, or on open field 
amid shell, shot, grape, and canister, had shriven the wounded, spoken 
of duty's crown to the fallen, and made pure for heaven and the land 
of unbroken peace the parting spirits of the valorous dead. 

When I told him of my purpose to recall in this lecture those 
scenes of past glory and woe, and the memory of the leader who had 
wrapped them round with imperishable fame, and shed over them the 
halo of immortality, the aged priest wrenched himself as if by a 
mighty effort from the vice-like grasp of the disease which crippled 
his frame. His voice shook with an emotion which I shall never 
forget. His hand pressed his brow as if to stir again to life his 
buried thoughts. His eyes, dimmed by years, sparkled through the 
large tears that filled them, as after a pause he made reply : " Ah, 
tell them, the young men of the South, that during four years these 
eyes have been the daily witnesses of deeds of selfless devotion and 

* [The late Rev. Darius Hubert, S. J.] 



CHIVALRY. 179 

endurance, which, when written, will dwarf the proudest records of 
ancient chivalry; tell them that the chieftain whose hand so often 
met mine in the warm grasp of friendship, and who, even at the head 
of a charging column, always paid me, the humble minister of Christ, 
the courteous homage of a reverential bow which a king might well 
envy, was a Christian knight, truest of the true, from foot to brow, 
from heel to crown, all noble. 

" Tell them that when in open and crowded convention the tall 
and handsome soldier accepted the position to which he was appointed 
by the State of Virginia, that of Commander-in-Chief of all her mili- 
tary forces, his was a calm, self-possessed dignity, the like of which I 
have not seen in other men. When, with the grace of manner which 
distinguished him, he accepted his new responsibilities, 'trusting in 
Almighty God, the voice of my approving conscience, and the aid of 
my fellow-citizens,' he was the picture of the ideal patriot marked as 
one to be forever remembered by all Americans. 

" There never was in history a great man whose life was one such 
blameless record of duty nobly done. 

" A perfect gentleman of a State long renowned for its chivalry, 
he was just, gentle, generous, childlike in the simplicity of his char- 
acter. His amiability of disposition, dee]) sympathy with those in 
sorrow and pain, his nice sense of personal honor, and genial courtesy 
endeared him to all his friends. I shall never forget his sweet, winning 
smile, and his clear, honest eyes, that seemed to look into your heart 
while they searched your brain. He is stamped upon my memory as 
a being apart and superior to all others— a man with whom few T of 
whom I have ever read are worthy to be classed." 



THE OKIGINS OF SOME OF THE COLONIAL FAMILIES 

OF LOUISIANA * 

BY CHARLES PATTON DIMITRY. 

[Charles Patton Dimitry, second son of Professor Alexander Dimitry, was born 
in Washington, D. C, July 31, 1837. He was educated, for the most part, at George- 
town College. During the Civil War he served in the Confederate Array as a private in 
the Louisiana Guards. Since the war he has been connected with the press of Baltimore, 
Washington, Richmond, and New Orleans. He has written several novels, which Mr. J. 
Wood Davidson, in the Living Writers of the South (1869), has pronounced "distinctly 
able, and all clearly above the range of the popular novels of the day." Of The House 
in Balfour Street, which Mr. Dimitry published in 1868, the same critic says: "[It 
reminds] one, by some vague temper pervading it, of Hawthorne and Dickens, at one 
and the same time, while it is utterly unlike both. There is as much of the poet as 
of the romancist in it." Mr. Dimitry's last work, issued in serials in the New Orleans 
Times Democrat, is Louisiana Families (1892-93).] 

The records of Louisiana's colonial families show that while many 
of their ancestors came hither directly from France, and many from 
San Domingo by the way of American cities more to the northward 
of us, the majority, probably (although of French ancestry), arrived in 
the colony as officers of the Infantry of the Marine (the Louisiana 
colonial troops) from Canada. There is also the Spanish element, 
which, from 1769, when the Spanish rule in Louisiana became estab- 
lished, added the infusion of Castilian blood to the old population. 
Ireland, too, sent many branches of her ancient families to give variety 
to the human mosaic of the peoples whose representatives, gathered 
together from afar, had laid the foundation of Louisiana society, giving 
to it its exceptional tone and qualities — its elegance, chivalry, and 
courtesy, and, it may be added, in all truth, its exemplary sense of 
honor and self-respect. 

Leading the list of provinces and departments of France which 
gave to Louisiana the elements of the majority of her old families is 
Brittany, a land of chivalry, of poetic and romantic memories, of a 
people pious, of brave soldiers and sailors. Normandy, also, the dwell- 
ing place of knights and seigneurs of old, whence went with William, 
their Duke, the barons whose names are read in the roll of Battle 
Abbey — Normandy, forever associated with memories of the rearing 

*[This selection forms part of the conclusion to the work entitled Louisiana 
Families, and was read by the author before an appreciative audience in New Orleans, 
November 13, 1893.] 



ORIOINS OF SOME COLONIAL FAMILIES OF LOUISIANA. 181 

of the structure of English laws and English society, and of the bring- 
ing to perfection and completeness the English language — Normandy, 
mingling in the land of conquest with the strong Saxon blood that 
had preceded the going thither of her sons and producing a people 
great at home, and not less great in their English-speaking progeny 
of the United States — Normandy sent many families to Louisiana. 
Others came from Provence, from Dauphine, from Lorraine, from 
Burgundy, from Champagne, Alsace, Poitou, the Bourbonnais, and 
some came from the cities of Paris, Marseilles, Nantes, and Bordeaux, 
and from the towns of Grenoble, La Eochelle, Noemy, Estampes, and 
Brie. Some came with titles of ancient nobility, with commissions 
signed by three Louises of France, as Knights of the Order of St. Louis, 
as officers of the army ; while others, bearing no titles, came to Louis- 
iana, breathing the free and ennobling air of which constituted for 
them and their posterity a liberal and sufficient patent of nobility. 

In following the lineages of some of our Louisiana families of greater 
or less antiquity there is a re-opening of doors, as it were, and strange 
and picturesque historical vistas appear before the mental vision. The 
characters, men and women, of forgotten days — days almost as extinct 
as if they never had been — come trooping before us. The crusader is 
there with face stern and martial in expression, and yet, in repose, 
illumined with the light of faith and of a pious zeal. The chatelain 
looks from castle-turret over his broad domain, and the men-at-arms 
cross the drawbridge according as the varying trumpet sounds the 
departure or the return. The marches of armies are again revealed ; 
from Italy they return to France singing songs of victory and bringing 
with them civilizing lessons from Padua and Mantua and Florence, and 
wonderful tales of the mighty civilizations, the embers of whose great- 
ness still smouldered on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. 

The mousquetaire gris or the mousquetaire noir, like that Chevalier 
de la Marjolaine, "toujours gai" crosses the scene with his pretty 
embroidered cloak, his high russet boots, his perfumed ringletty hair, 
and his steel-sheathed rapier. Among those who appear and disap- 
pear, filling the intervals of the generations, are King's Councillors, 
Councillors of Parliament, officers in the households of kings and in 
their military and naval services, chevaliers, some so born and some so 
appointed, men adorning the civil and unofficial walks of life. There 
are there, also, the glint of jewels, of coronets, of gold and silver 
decorations and ornaments, and the garbs of silk and satin, velvet and 
cloth. In a palace of the ancient Scottish Kings a man out of Italy 
(David Kizzio was his name), with dark, languishing eyes, in his com- 
position something of the troubadour, the improvisatore, the professor, 
but most of all the lover, reclines upon a rude flooring, on a damask 



182 SPECIMENS OF ORATORY. 

of the weavery of the looms of Venice, at the feet of a royal patroness, 
a beautiful queen, the azure of whose eyes, the rudely hue of whose 
hair, and the pink and white of whose satin cheeks are repeated in 
the eyes and hair and cheeks of the fair maids of honor who sur- 
round her, sitting at their spinning-wheels and listening mute while 
the troubadour touches with suave fingers the strings of his mandolin, 
singing for their delectation love songs of the Arno and gay barcaroles 
of the lagunas of Venice, or relates the legends of spectre-haunted 
halls of gray Florentine palaces, the story of the riches of the Medicis, 
the traditions of the Vivaldis, the Grimaldis, and the Dorias, of Genoa, 
the tale of the two lovers of Verona, Messer Komeo Montesche and 
sweet Madama Giulietta Capoletto, who died for love and were en- 
tombed together in the tomb of the Capoletti in the Campo-Santo of 
the old Italian city, and the quaint sayings of Ser Kiggoletto, the 
Duke's jester of Mantua. And so, as the nearer doors open and the 
more modern vistas appear, the vistas revealed are vistas of Louisiana 
— fairest scene of all— her forests, her prairies, her dark and odorous 
lagoons. Bienville, with light helmet decked with feathers, and clad 
in half-armor, walks in the Place d' Amies with his officers, while the 
rolling of the drums that beat a salute at morn to the flag of the fleur- 
de-lvs blends with the hymn that is sung in the old convent on Concle 
Street by the pious sisterhood of the ITrsuiine Nuns. 

Sometimes a pedestrian wending his way late at night along a city's 
street will hear, coming from a dwelling, the sounds of music, the 
murmur of many voices, the echoes of merry laughter. If he will 
pause for awhile at the window and gaze at the scene, he will behold a 
goodly company, gallant men and graceful women. But there must 
come a time when the merriment is over, and when silence and quiet 
prevail where was bustle and motion. And so the lights are extin- 
guished, and, like visions wrought by the imagination out of enchanted 
materials, the company vanishes, the gallant men and the graceful 
women disappear, and are seen no more. 



PART III. 

ESSAYS. 

SECTION I. CONTROVERSIAL. 



THE BATTURE CASE. 



BY EDWARD LIVINGSTON. 



[Edward Livingston, born in Clermont, N. Y., May 26, 1764; died in Rhinebeck, 
N. Y., May 23, 1836. Vide page 62.] 

[ANSWER TO THOMAS JEFFERSON.] 

"Ah! little knowest thou, who hast not tried, 
What hell it is in suing long to bide; 
To lose good days that might be better spent, 
To pass long nights in pensive discontent; 
To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow, 
To feed on hope, to pine with fear and sorrow; 
To fret thy soul with crosses and with care, 
To eat thy heart through comfortless despair; 
To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run, 
To spend, to give, to want, to be undone; 
Unhappy wight! such hard fate doomed to try ; 
That fate God send unto mine enemy." 

Spenser. 

When a public functionary abuses his power by an act which bears 
on the community, his conduct excites attention, provokes popular re- 
sentment, and seldom fails to receive the punishment it merits. Should 
an individual be chosen for the victim, little sympathy is created for 
his sufferings, if the interest of all is supposed to be promoted by the 
ruin of one. The gloss of zeal for the public is therefore always spread 
over acts of oppression, and the people are sometimes made to consider 
that as a brilliant exertion of energy in their favor, which, when 
viewed in its true light, would be found a fatal blow to their rights. 

In no government is this effect so easily produced as in a free 
republic : party spirit, inseparable from its existence, there aids the 
illusion, and a popular leader is allowed in many instances impunity, 
and sometimes rewarded with applause for acts that would make a 
tyrant tremble on his throne. This evil must exist in a degree ; it is 
founded in the natural course of human passions. But in a wise and 
enlightened nation it will be restrained, and the consciousness that it 
must exist will make such a people more watchful to prevent its abuse. 
These reflections occur to one whose property, without trial or any of 
the forms of law, has been violently seized by the First Magistrate of 



186 ESS A YS—CONTRO VERSIA L. 

the Union, who has hitherto vainly solicited an inquiry into his title, 
who has seen the conduct of his oppressor excused or applauded, and 
who, in the book he is about to examine, finds an attempt openly to 
justify that conduct upon principles as dangerous as the act was illegal 
and unjust. This book relates to a case which has long been before 
the public, and purports to.be the substance of instructions prepared 
by Thomas Jefferson, late President of the United States, for his 
counsel in a suit instituted by me against him. After a few years' 
earnest entreaty, I have at length obtained a statement of the reasons 
which induced him to take those violent and unconstitutional measures 
of which I have complained. 

It would perhaps be deemed unreasonable to quarrel -with Mr. 
Jefferson for the delay, when we reflect how necessary Mr. Moreau's 
Latin and Mr. Thierry's Greek, Poydras' elegant invective and his own 
Anglo-Saxon researches, were to excuse an act, for which, at the time 
he committed it, he had no one plausible reason to allege. Such an 
act is certainly easier to perform than to justify ; and Mr. Jefferson has 
been right in taking four years to consider what excuse he should give 
to the world for his conduct, and still more so in laying under contri- 
bution all writings, all languages, all laws, and in calling to his aid all 
the popular prejudices which his own conduct had excited against me. 
He wanted all this, and more, to make a decent defence. But it was 
rather awkward to press into his service facts which it is confessed he 
did not know at the time, and something worse than awkward to 
impose on the public by false translations and garbled testimony. But 
we must excuse the late President. " His wish had rather been for a 
full investigation of the merits at the bar, that the public might 
learn in that way that their servants had done nothing but what the 
laws had authorized and required them to do" — "and precluded now 
from this mode of justification, he adopts that of publishing what was 
meant originally for the private eye of counsel." I give the words of 
the author here, lest in this extraordinary sentence I should be sus- 
pected of having misrepresented or misunderstood him. An individual 
holding a tract of land under one whose title has been acknowledged, 
and whose possession has been confirmed by a court of competent 
authority, is violently dispossessed by the orders of the President of the 
United States, without any of the forms of law and in violation of the 
most sacred provisions of the Constitution. The ruined sufferer seeks 
redress first by expostulation : he offers to submit to the decision of 
indifferent men, and he is refused ; he offers to abide by men chosen 
by the President, and he is refused ; he offers, in the simplicity of his 
heart, to acquiesce in the opinion of the President himself, and he is 
refused. He is not even permitted to exhibit his proofs. Fearing the 



THE BATTURE CASE. m 

conviction they would produce, he is told that, though the President 
con d take, he cannot restore ; that he can injure, hut not redrels , 
hat Congress alone are competent to grant him relief. To Co,m-e« 
then he applies : here the same baneful influence prevails. Afto wo 
voyages of three thousand miles each, after two years of pain u , 
penae and hum, hating solicitation, after the attendance oh e . 1" 
sions he finds that no means can be devised for his relief-that L 
f nend. of that man who " wishes for a full investigation rfth^erL 
at the bar "defeat every plan for bringing the cLe before a court 
-te against every law providing for a trial, and effectually as S 
think and £ hopes, bar all access to any tribunal where he dreaded 
merits of the case could be shown. Harassed but not dispWtefl the 
njured party, finding that no legislative aid can be expected to Store 
his property at length applies lor a compensation Tdlmage He 
appeals to the laws of his country, and is willing to abide by the 
decision of a jury, m a country where long residence, great wealth the 
mflnence which had been created by office, and a coi'nfidenc of ,„1 ti 
cal opinion gave every advantage to his opponent. Here, then is an 
opportnnflv which a man desirous of open investigation will no t 

confulon ' Tmf w *° ^ COU " t, ' v ' »* "'^ his -user vith 
confusion. The vigilant guardian of the public rights will defend 

Xlm He^n^f te r" tnl "" Wl - aBd " N '" >Se th « -1-ii of t 
intruder He who stands "conscious and erect" will rejoice in the 

mves igatiou of his innocence ; he will discard every form, and proudly 
dare Ins adversary to a discussion of the merits ' " 

not dotels '"Ttef SWd ]\f i'' 068 "?' d0 thk; the man X s l' eak of dare 
not do this. He feared the learned integrity of a court ; he feared the 

honest independence of a jury. He entrenched himself 'in dZZrevs . 
sneaked behind a paltry plea to the jurisdiction, and now puSelto 

t^htwsh ,m,, 1 ^'''1''*^r m tWs m ° <le 0f *"*£■*£ and 
ttart Ins wish had been for a full investigation of the merits at the 

If such indeed were his wish, why was it not gratified* and by 

bom was heprec luMl from this favorite mode of defence? ' He docs 

no indeed hazard the direct assertion that it was the unsolicited act 

of the court. His plea to the jurisdiction, his demurrers-not to me,, 

ion an attempt to stifle the suit in its birth by a rule to find security 

for costs-all these would too apparently falsify such an assertion 

veved r?V "? St f 6d " d!reCt te ™ s > is not «* *>» strongly com 
^eyed? Was it not meant to be thus conveyed? When Mr Jeffer 

Z tit '-'r the ft T fl , is,nissed °" the ^ estion «*' i»isd ctlt 

and that "his wish had rather been for a full investigation of the 



188 ESSA YS—CONTRO VERSIAL. 

merits .at the bar," 1 what are we to conclude ? What, I repeat, did 
he intend we should conclude, but that the decision of the court 
was unsolicited, and contrary to his wish ? And } T et he, the gentle- 
man who tells us this, had put in a plea to the jurisdiction ; that is 
to say, prayed the court to dismiss the case without an investigation 
of the merits. He did more. Fearing that the question might be 
decided against him, he put in a demurrer to the declaration ; that 
is to say, he took an exception to its form, and prayed the court a 
second time that on this account also the case might be dismissed 
without an investigation of the merits. He did not stop here. A 
third battery was erected. He pleaded another plea, that he did the 
act complained of as President of the United States, and therefore he 
ought not to be made liable in his individual capacity ; and a third 
time prayed the court that the case might be dismissed without an 
investigation of the merits. How Mr. Jefferson can reconcile these 
pleas with his wish to obtain a hearing on the merits, it is difficult to 
conceive. The coward who, on receiving a challenge, resorts to the 
interposition of a magistrate, might as well bluster about his desire 
fairly to face his adversary, and complain that he was precluded from 
giving him satisfaction. Yet this preclusion is stated by Mr. Jefferson 
as his reason for publishing the work which I am now about to exam- 
ine. He had many advantages in the execution, and promised himself 
many more in the effects, of this production. The subject has been 
fully and ably discussed, but the publications on the adverse side were 
not in many hands. A considerable time had elapsed since the sub- 
ject engaged the public attention. He had, therefore, only to arrange 
the arguments in his favor, to suppress or mutilate the conclusive 
answers which had been given to them, to collect all the quotations 
which had been issued in the discussion, to give a new dress and the 
sanction of his name to the calumnies circulated against his opponent ; 
and he could make a book that should astonish by the polyglot learn- 
ing of its quotations, amaze by the profundity of its borrowed research, 
and delight kindred minds by the poignant elegance of its satire. Add 
to these the advantages of using hearsay testimony, ex parte testimony, 
interested testimon} T , his own testimony ; of quoting authorities, with 
an et cetera for those parts which bear against his positions ; of omit- 
ting a word in the translation of a deed, and founding a long argument 
on the false reading thus created ; add the facility of gaining over to 
his party that large portion of mankind who find it much more 
convenient to be convinced by the reputation of the author than to 
examine his work ; and, above all, the hope that disappointment and 
despondence might silence his opponent — and we shall have much bet- 
ter reasons for resorting to a publication of his " instructions to coun- 



THE BATTURE CASE. 189 

sel," than the alleged preclusion of a hearing at the bar. Whatever 
may have been the causes which produced this work, I rejoice exceed- 
ingly in the effect. My wish also had rather been for a full investiga- 
tion of the merits at the bar ; but an appeal to the public is preferred, 
and I shall not decline it. Causes of less importance have sometimes 
excited an interest not only in the countries where they originated, 
but abroad. The despotic King of Prussia could not oppress one of 
his subjects under the forms of law, without exciting the indignation 
of Europe. Lawyers of the greatest eminence took cognizance of the 
affair ; and the force of public opinion, even in a military monarchy, 
obliged the Prince to do justice to the vassal. Shall I, then, fear a 
less beneficial effect, when I can show that the free citizen of a free 
country has been deprived of his property by its First Magistrate, 
without even the forms of law ? I do not fear it. However dull may 
be the discussion, however laborious the research, it will not deter 
those who have an interest in inquiring whether their " servant has 
done his duty," or has been guilty of unconstitutional violence. I 
invite readers of this description to follow me in the investigation I 
am about to make. So much misrepresentation has been used in the 
discussion that it will be necessary to begin with a statement of facts, 
which shall be as brief as may be consistent with a development of 
material circumstances. 

The Mississippi flows through a country evidently gained from 
the sea, for about one hundred and fifty miles from its mouth. On 
the western side, alluvial country has a much greater extent. As in 
all lands formed wholly by the deposit of rivers which overflow, the 
ground is highest near the bank, and slopes in an inclined plane to the 
level of the waters which receive those of the river, terminating here 
at irregular distances in cypress swamps or trembling prairies* This 
conformation of the soil is very evident and uniform on the Mississippi. 
The surface of the water, when it is not swelled by the rains and dis- 
solving snows above, is at New Orleans about nine feet below the 
natural bank. When swelled to its greatest height, it rises about five 
feet above the level of the bank, and would of course overflow the 
whole country, unless dykes, there called levees, were raised to con- 
fine it. These are about the average measures. There are places in 
which they vary, where the natural bank is not above five or six feet 
above the surface at low water, and where, of course, an embank- 
ment of nine feet and upwards is necessary to retain the water in its 
swell. 

* Those marshes which have not acquired a sufficient consistency to produce trees, 
and shake to a considerable distance when trodden on, are, in Louisiana, called prairies 
tremblantes. 



1 90 ESS A YS—CONTRO VERSIAL. 

The Mississippi is a deep, rapid, meandering, and turbid river. 
From these characteristics it results that, where it flows, as it gener- 
ally does, through a light soil, it makes frequent encroachments on the 
one bank ; and wherever the water becomes stagnant behind a point, 
or at the edge of an eddy, leaves a deposit on the other. Should this 
deposit be made in the middle of the river, it forms a sandbank, and 
when it rises above the surface of the water at its natural height, an 
island. But if the deposit be made, as it generally is, adjacent to the 
bank, it then becomes what is called in the country a hatt/we, or allu- 
vion. These battures, low at first, gradually rise, by successive de- 
posits, above the surface of the water at its natural height ; and when 
they are increased, so as not to leave more than five or six feet of 
water upon them at the time of the inundation — that is to say, when 
they attain the height, or nearly the height, of the natural bank — the 
proprietor of the land in front of which they are formed generally 
raises a new embankment, or levee, so as to include the soil thus created, 
and protect it from the inundation. The land thus gained becomes 
incorporated with the original plantation, the old embankment is suf- 
fered to decay, and the road is generally removed, so as to continue 
along the course of the old levee. These battures are very common on 
the banks of the Mississippi, and, as the land is valuable, they are 
generally reclaimed in the manner I have stated. 

The only lands in the lower part of the province which were 
capable of cultivation lie immediately on the river and its branches, 
here called bayous; the grants therefore were located in an oblong 
form, extending generally from ten to twenty arpents in front, by 
forty in depth, except in particular situations, in which the nature of 
the soil induced the grantee to take a greater extent back. The road 
was parallel to the river, generally within the embankment, but some- 
times upon it. 

This land was acquired by the order of Jesuits in three different 
purchases — one in the year 1726 from Mr. de Bienville, Governor of 
the Province, another from the same person in 1728, and a third in 
1743 from Mr. Breton. 

In the year 1763 the order of Jesuits was abolished, and all its 
estates forfeited to the Crown. Although the province had been ceded 
by France to Spain, yet as the treaty was still secret and was not 
executed until six years afterwards, the edict of confiscation took 
place for the benefit of the Crown of France, and under it the estate 
of the Jesuits of New Orleans was seized. These thirty-two arpents 
forming a part of it were divided into six lots, and sold at auction by 
the same usual description, so many acres front. The part of this land 
adjoining the city was purchased by persons from whom it passed, 



THE BATTURE CASE. 191 

by regular conveyance, to Bertram! Gravier, who cultivated it as a 
plantation. . . . 

Having established to his own satisfaction that the United States 
were not bound by the proceedings in the suit which had been deter- 
mined, the most natural course to be expected would be for the Presi- 
dent to institute one to which they should be a party ; but this was 
too much in the common line. Mr. Jefferson did not like playing at 
"push-pin," as he elegantly terms it ; the forms of law were too stow 
to satisfy his eager desire to do justice. There had been a commotion 
among the people— there had been an open opposition to the execution 
of the laws ; and he seems to have had a natural sympathy for those 
who were guilty of it. Profaning the sacred exertions of our own 
Revolutionary patriots by an assimulation with his own agency in the 
paltry squabble, his imagination took fire at a striking similarity he 
discovered between the judgment in the case of the batture and the 
Massachusetts Port Bill, between the opening of my canal and the 
*' occlusion" of the Boston harbor— he pants for 'the wreaths of 
Hancock, Adams, and Otis— and he bravely determines to hurl all the 
vengeance of the Government at the unprotected head of an humble 
individual, who had nothing for his defence but the feeble barriers of 
Constitution, Treaty, and Laws. 



SECESSION AND COERCION.* 

BY B. J. SAGE. 

[Bernard Janin Sage, the well-known Louisiana lawyer, was, in 1865, one of the 
counsel selected to defend Jefferson Davis against the charge of treason. Being at 
the time in London, he sent from that city the proof-sheets of his Republic of Republics, 
which purported to be the monograph of P. C. Centz, an English barrister. After care- 
fully reading this work, Charles O'Conor, chief of the Davis counsel, wrote to the 
author, who was still in England : " If upon the numerous points that any lawyer can 
see in the case I could prepare so admirable and overwhelmingly conclusive a brief as 
the protest, my task (of defending Davis) would be slight indeed."] 

It is incontrovertible that the federal system is states united, and 
that these must always be sovereign, and superior to the governments 
they create. It is equally plain that the " national unity," the " abso- 
lute supremacy" of "the government," and the allegiance of the 
states thereto, which are asserted by the Massachusetts school, are 
absurd and pernicious, as well as traitorous falsehoods. 

This "federal system" is precisely what Montesquieu and other 
publicists happily call a " republic of republics." Natural persons by 
social compact form the society called the state, which is a republic. 
Such state is a moral or political person, as contra-distinguished from 
a natural one. For mutual protection and general government, it 
joins other such political persons in federal compact, thus forming 
the " republic of republics," or " union of states," as the federal 
instrument characterizes the system formed by it. " Community of 
communities," "confederation of republics," "united states," etc., 
etc., are other phrases of public writers, signifying the same political 
system. 

Natural persons, then, form states, while these, as political persons, 
form the federation called "the United States." The constitution 
contemplates these political bodies as solely the sources of power, and 
of- elective right. Every voter acts for the state, and gets his special 
endowment of authority to vote from her alone. She settles the 
matter, as a sovereign, in her organic law. Hence we see that the 
representatives are elected by the states, as are the senators and 
the President ; and that all of these, together with the officers they 
appoint, are " the government of the . . . states " under " the 
constitution of the . . . states." 

* {Republic of Republics. ] 



SECESSION AND COERCION. 193 

Omitting from the above constitutional phrases the participial 
adjective which, with the sense of joined or associated, qualities or 
describes states, we easily distinguish between the political entities 
that form the federal system, and their mere qualities ; and see that 
the only nation we have, or can have, is self-united or associated states 
— the system being properly described as a " republic of republics," or 
a " union of states." 

NO CONSTITUTIONAL COERCION OF STATES. 

Our states being equal and voluntarily joined, the constitution 
being the expression of their will, and the federal government being 
their agency, in the very nature of things no coercive power over 
them could be derived from the constitution. Moreover, if they were 
once voluntary parties, they could not have become involuntary ones, 
without their own action ; for they have the sole power of amend- 
ment,'" and, to cap the climax, the fathers were unanimous in exclud- 
ing the power of coercion from the federal compact, and, out of 
abundance of caution, guarding against it by amendment, all of which 
will be hereafter fully shown. Buchanan, Lincoln, and others argued 
that the recent exertion of federal force against certain states was not 
coercion of states, but was military coercion of persons banded to 
oppose the federal laws, or, in other words, the putting down of a 
rebellion. But such views are dignified by calling them weak soph- 
istry. For the said states acted as bodies in making the constitution ; 
they moved as such in seceding ; and they warred as such in resisting 
coercion. And, in each case, they respectively exercised that right of 
command over the citizens which results from the social compact, 
binding each to obey the collective will, and which is sovereignty 
itself. On the other hand, the federal functionaries were fighting to 
enforce an ordinance which the state had originally ordained, but had 
repealed, and made it treasonable to obey ; namely, the ordinance of 
ratification, which, as to the said state and her citizens, gave to the 
said constitution, and the resultant government, their only possible 
validity and warrant. 

THE ONLY BASIS OF COERCION. 

To coerce a state is unconstitutional ; but it is equally true that 
the precedent of coercing states is established, and that it is defensible 
under the law of nations. If this be correct, all will agree that such 
ultima ratio should be placed at once on its own ground, and its limits 

* See Art. V. 
13 



194 ESS A YS—CONTR VERSIAL. 

defined, so that our constitution may be vindicated and held sacred in 
the future, and the conscience of the people of the victorious states be 
relieved of the charge of violating the " supreme law of the land," in 
coercing the states that ordained it, and killing their people for 
defending them ; for nothing can more demoralize, and finally demon- 
ize, the people, individually and collectively, than the consciousness 
of having committed such crimes, the determined enjoyment of the 
fruits thereof, and the constant making of false excuses to their 
consciences and to the world. 

Where the constitution does not provide a treaty stipulation or 
conventional rule, by which to settle a question arising among or 
between our states, the law of nations is to be resorted to, for the 
constitution only displaces such law pro tanto. This law would, if 
the federal compact were annulled, at once govern all questions among 
our states, just as it now does those arising among the states of 
Europe. The truth is, the purpose of the federal compact was the 
settlement of such international questions as it provides for and closes, 
such questions having been, as long as they were open and debatable, 
international ones. And it may be well to observe here, that the word 
" states," used in the constitution to designate the contracting powers 
that ratify and make it, is used in juxtaposition with, and has the 
identical meaning of, the word " states " that signifies the powers of 
Europe ; * and it is absurd to suppose that Massachusetts, New York, 
or Yirginia, in making a constitution of government, deprived herself 
of statehood or nationality, when she merely declared her will which 
remained in her, and parted with no portion of her own being ; and 
when her name, description, and essentials were, after associating, 
entirely unchanged ; neither the constitution nor history warrants the 
restricted meaning vulgarly given in our country to the word " states." 
Accurately speaking, it was nations or states that federated, and 
thereby formed our " community of communities," or " republic of 
republics." 

In seceding, the Southern commonwealths exercised an indisput- 
able right, though they acted with impolicy, and erred in ignoring the 
operation of international law. In higher politics — those of nations 
in their dealings with one another — acts become precedents, and make 
rules of law. So, in the case before us, the successful coercion of 
states made a precedent, and established a law. As secession affected 
the interest of the adhering states, questions arose for them to con- 
sider ; and, treating the matter as one in foro conscientice, they could 
cogently reason that the case of a seceding state, to make her seces- 
sion justifiable under the jus gentium, should contain the same ingre- 

*See Art. III., sect. 2 ; Art. XL, Amendments. 



SECESSION AND COERCION. 195 

dient that makes a homicide one of self-defence — the previous " retreat 
to the wall." 

The Southern commonwealths were really fighting for constitu- 
tional liberty, which, under the circumstances, they thought seriously 
imperilled, and likely to be preserved by secession. Earl Russell's 
assertion was true, that " the South fought for independence, the 
North for empire." The wish of the former for constitutional liberty 
and independence was manifested by their adopting the federal con- 
stitution with scarcely a change. Secession was justifiable if there 
was no other mode of self-preservation, or remedy for wrongs ; for 
self-preservation was the first law of nature to states as well as per- 
sons. But they had not properly come to this last resort, as we shall 
see, by noting the impleaded pleas of the states that remained united — 
pleas under the jus gentium. 

First. These had the right to assume that Providence intended, as 
our fathers did, that all the territory between British America and 
Mexico should be under one political system, and they had a right 
(not under the constitution, which the state voluntarily made and 
could voluntarily abandon, but) under the jus gentium to prevent or 
to cure disruption. 

Second. They had the right to object to the establishment of a 
contiguous foreign state or federation, with its necessary rivalry, and 
antagonistic interests and policy, and the inevitable and ever-recurring 
international troubles. 

Third. They could complain that, in spite of constitutional engage- 
ments, as well as in disregard of the respect due to the fathers, seces- 
sion should be resorted to before exhausting all the remedies con- 
templated and provided for in the constitution, or arising out of the 
circumstances ; especially as Congress, the Supreme Court, and a 
numerical majority of about a million popular votes were on the side 
of conservatism against a weak President, and could make the remedies 
efficient. This alone was justification enough under the jus gentium 
for the adhering states to coerce back the seceding ones. 

And other pleas might have been made — as to the territory 
occupied by the new states, as to forts, armaments, public property, 
etc., as well as the federal debt. In all these cases, precision of plead- 
ing and absolute sufficiency were unnecessary, for states are to judge 
for themselves, in the last resort, as to subjects of complaint and cases 
of war ; and our states, in their federal constitution, provided no mode 
of settlement or tribunal for such matters, so that the law of nations 
was the only resort for rules of action. 

And here it is well to observe that while the seceding states acted 
with impolicy, and were wrong in the respects and to the degree 



196 ESSAYS— CONTROVERSIAL. 

mentioned, the coercing ones were gravely to blame for the original 
causes of the trouble — for constant and manifold aggressions and acts 
of injustice ; and, finally, for their non-conciliatory and uncompromising 
spirit, and their disinclination to resort to diplomatic expedients under 
the law of nations to avoid so awful a recourse as war, which, if it can 
be avoided with honor and integrity, is a most heinous crime. And, 
moreover, a party demanding justice before any tribunal must have 
himself sought to do justice. 

OUR SYSTEM AS THUS MODIFIED. 

The precedent, then, may be considered as established (not in the 
constitutional, but) in the international part of our law and politics, 
that all other means of getting justice and preserving self-government 
and statehood must be exhausted before secession is allowable. But 
it is as republics that states are to be held in, or coerced back to, 
the Union ; for the great end always in view is the preservation of 
constitutional liberty, as established in the states, under the guidance 
of the fathers, and this necessitates absolute self-government of the 
people as organized. 

These, then, may be considered as the cardinal principles of our 
system, as it stands at present : (1) AVe have states self -associated for 
their self -protection and self-government. (2) Their status is that of 
sovereign political bodies, known to the law of nations, and described 
in the constitution, as states. (3) Being republics, or self-governing 
peoples, they must, according to the law of their nature, govern them- 
selves, not in any qualified sense, but absolutely. (4) Their govern- 
ments, state and federal, are agencies, and subordinate to them. 

(5) The federal agency has the joint authority of the states to govern 
their citizens within certain limits, and wield the coercive means 
intrusted to it. But there is but one rule of duty for it ; i. e., the 
constitution, which each member of the agency is sworn strictly to 
observe, and which cannot be disregarded without perjured usurpation. 

(6) The states must remain in the Union till the last remedy the 
constitution affords against injustice and loss of self-government and 
statehood has been resorted to. (7) When constitutional means are 
exhausted, or show themselves to be vain, any means of self-preserva- 
tion is justifiable to a state, for it is according to the first law of 
nature. (8) If secession be the remedy a state finally determines on, 
it affords the occasion for diplomacy or war, as among other nations. 

TWO IMPORTANT IDEAS. 

1. Suppose given states, then, to have gone through the forms of 
secession ; the adhering ones, without denying either the fact or the 



SECESSION AND COERCION. . 197 

right of secession, may, for the sake of the argument (i. e., the ultima, 
ratio), concede that the former are out of the Union, proceed to fight 
them as foreign states amenable to the jus gentium, and enforce their 
return to the Union; while, on the other hand, the coerced states 
cannot invoke, as against such coercion, the constitution they have 
abandoned. 

2. Upon such basis, the coercion of states is not inconsistent with 
the federal compact. But the states victorious in the recent war 
claimed that the acts of secession Avere null, and that they resorted to 
constitutional coercion. By these pleas they simply convicted them- 
selves of warring upon states in the Union, of violating the constitu- 
tion, and of causing flagrant usurpation and perjury on the part of 
their rulers. Nay, more, they have done the infinite mischief of mak- 
ing these high crimes precedents for the future ; of justifying pleas of 
necessity for arbitrary acts — the very things constitutions were estab- 
lished to prevent ; of introducing and vindicating unlimited discretion 
and regal prerogatives in the federal agency ; and, finally, of showing 
the states that, if aggrieved, their only alternatives are submission or 
war. Such were not the ideas of the fathers ! 

As to the right of secession, it [can] ... be shown, by author- 
ities that no one will venture to gainsay, that it is (not constitutional 
but) inherent and inalienable ; that it is absolutely essential to, and 
pro tanto identical with, freedom ; and that it was taken for granted, 
as expressly stated, by the fathers as indispensable to preserve state- 
hood and liberty. It is, indeed, a right as absolute and indestructible 
as the state itself. Without it sovereignty cannot exist, and there 
can be no self-preservation of the original and only constituents of our 
" republic of republics." * 

* Every American ought to read Is Davis a Traitor ? by Professor Bledsoe. Most 
conclusively does it vindicate the right of secession, and it forms the best criticism ever 
written of the constitutional expositions of Story and Webster. With great deference, 
however, I object to his implication that secession is a constitutional right. So with the 
assumption of Mr. A. H. Stephens and others, in 1868, at the White Sulphur Springs, 
that the right of secession can be abandoned. Self-preservation is the first law of nature 
— most especially to commonwealths; and God designs a state to secede if her " defence" 
and " welfare," which he has charged her with preserving and promoting, require it. 



MR. CABLE'S FBEEDMAN'S CASE IN EQUITY. 

BY CHARLES GAYARRE. 

We take notice of Mr. Cable's Freedmcm's Case m Equity published 
in the December Century* We depart from the workshop of fiction 
and caricature, and we enter the solemn temple of justice, where Mr. 
Cable appears as a self -constituted attorney " in the equity case " which 
he upholds, on behalf of the colored race, against the systematically 
oppressing, tyrannically inclined, and perjured white race of the whole 
South, that continues to be oblivious of its most solemnly sworn obli- 
gations: We beg Mr. Cable to keep in mind that it is he who attacks, 
and he who puts us on the defence. 

We read Mr. Cable's article three times, with extreme fatigue, before 
we could have a very clear conception of what it meant. In every phrase 
the words are so unnecessarily and densely crowded, in chaotic confus- 
ion, round the sense intended to be conveyed ! It reminds us of the 
artichoke, whose eatable substance cannot be reached without patiently 
removing the numerous prickly scales that envelop the fleshy base 
which is sought after. It was not an easy road for us to travel, before 
arriving at Mr. Cable's conclusions, and tasting on the tip of our 
tongue the panacea which he trumpets forth to cure our Southern 
leprosies, and guard us against the social, political, moral, judicial, and 
legislative iniquities that threaten us with another bloody revolution 
and final perdition. What beating of the bush it requires to make Mr. 
Cable's rabbit run out of its shelter of briars ! It is a timid animal. 
It shows first the tip of its whiskers, or of its long ears ; then one 
half-concealed foot, or perhaps a peep at its tail may be permitted, 
before it ventures out in full view of the hunter and dares his shot. 
We much prefer the open and bold position of the anarchist, the 
socialist, the communist, and the nihilist. They tell us plainly the 
extent of destruction which they meditate. They are levellers ; Mr. 
Cable, the would-be regenerator, is a mere plasterer, or patcher. 

Mr. Cable delights in raving promulgations of new and startling 
principles, in the utterances of tempestuous expressions against his 
supposed antagonists, however respectable they may be for intellect 
and virtue. But his most violent denunciations, in his epileptic fits of 
periodical indignation at the condition of our prisons and of the 
* [Vide Century Magazine, Vol. I., 1885.] 



MR. CABLE'S FREEDMAN'S CASE IN EQUITY. 199 

tortured negro, are generally accompanied by velvety reticences to 
escape from too perilous responsibilities. He seems to speculate in 
sensational attitudes and stage effect, on whose financial success he 
confidently relies. His style is peculiar ; it is emphatically his own 
m equity, by the right of invention. He cannot be accused of servile 
imitation. It is not the English to which we have been accustomed, 
and therefore we solicit his indulgence if we in any way misunder- 
stand and misstate his premises and the deductions resulting from their 
acceptance. We are not sure that we can ascertain to our satisfaction 
the true quality and nature of the driftwood which he hurries on to 
market, and which floats indistinctly on a foggy stream of illogical 
reasonings and more than doubtful statements. He evidently aims 
at a new language to enunciate new principles. Be it so ; but we 
object to its obscurity and to the writer's chronic mania of entangling 
and twisting every sentence like a cat playing with a spool of cotton. 
It gives much trouble to the reader, who is anxious to profit, without 
too much study and a headache, by the discoveries of that learned 
professor of ethics and. Darwinian evolver of equities, on which a new 
order of society is to be established under his auspices. Mr. Cable is 
a Louisianian, and has talent. We might be disposed to admire him if 
he understood the propriety of being less incisive, not to say insult- 
ing, in his admonitions, and if he had the modesty to assume a less 
lofty tone of moral and intellectual superiority in his dictations over 
a vast number of his fellow-citizens, whom, in the face of the world, 
without the slightest hesitation and without the least sign of regret, 
he proclaims as guilty of the basest malignancy, the most systematic 
tyranny, and the most drivelling imbecility. As to imbecilitv, we 
personally plead guilty ; for we confess that, while one page of Addi- 
son's or of Edmund Burke's refreshes and brightens our intellect, the 
complicated sentences of Mr. Cable obscure and fatigue it to' the 
utmost. If we were, as a professional critic, to qualify the style of 
this author, we would call it Labyrinthine. It imposes too much 
groping and wandering before discovering the bull in his hiding-place 
and taking him by the horns. We think, however, that we have at 
last, after considerable labor, succeeded in obtaining a clear view of 
the four-footed beast in all its proportions. 

Mr. Cable begins his article with this assertion : " The greatest 
problem before the American people to-day is, as it has been for a 
hundred years, the presence among us of the negro." We fully agree 
with him on this point, and we do not hesitate to add : That the prob- 
lem resulting now from the presence of the freedman entails on us of 
the white race a question more difficult to solve satisfactorily, than 
the one which formerly proceeded from his presence as a slave. 



200 ESS A YS— CONTR VERSIA L. 

We further aver, with the deepest conviction, that the existence in 
the same country of two races, as different as day and night in their 
physical and spiritual endowments, and apparently incapable of fusing 
into a homogeneous whole, is the most dreadful calamity that ever 
could befall a community. History tells us the terrible struggles that 
have always resulted from the meeting of even two white races on the 
same soil, notwithstanding the practicability, in the course of centuries, 
of their gradually forming a unit by intermarriage. All the various 
records of mankind contain a long recital of the total annihilation or 
expulsion of races by races. In many parts of civilized Europe, at 
this day, where different white races have been inhabiting the same 
territory for ages, they still entertain toward one another a deadly 
enmity, which fatally breaks out like the lava of a volcano, whenever 
the opportunity presents itself. 

In England it was a disgrace, during a long time, even for a poor 
Norman knight to marry a rich Saxon princess. At least, so thought 
the Norman dames. For them she was the mulattress of the epoch, 
although as white as new-fallen snow. In their eye such a mesalliance 
could be palliated only by the necessity of complying with the exi- 
gencies of worldly policy and ambition, if not prompted by sordid 
interest. But Normans and Saxons could fuse, and they did fuse at 
last, although the latter had been considered by the former as hardly 
better than swine. 

Another striking instance is Avhat happened in Spain. The ancient 
population of that country and the invading Goths soon merged into 
an harmonious nationality. The two races had entertained no in- 
stinctive repugnance for each other. Next came the swarthy Arabs 
and the darker-hued Moors, very distinct in color from the descendants 
of the Goths. What followed ? Assimilation! Fusion! No. Eight 
hundred years of bloody conflicts, until one of the races exterminated 
the other. What is now taking place in Algeria ? Are the Arabs 
becoming French, or the French turning Arabs? Or are the two 
races breeding hybrids ? No. It is not long since an Arab chief said 
to a French officer, his friend : " If a Frenchman and an Arab were 
boiled down together, so that there remained only their bones, those 
bones would instantly separate." Therefore, the fact that the popula- 
tion of our State is about equally divided between the Caucasian race 
and the African must be considered as presenting a question of an 
awful nature, if examined by the light of history and of undeniable 
precedents. Surely it is a question to be anxiously studied with the 
calm reason, the profound knowledge, the sagacious foresight, of a 
statesman, and is not to be superficially treated with the unpardon- 
able flippancy of a sentimental aspirant to notoriety, the arrogant 



MR. CABLE'S FREEDMAN'S CASE IN EQUITY. 201 

superciliousness of an improvised pedagogue, the exorbitant conceit of 
a self-worshipping censor of public and private morals, or with the 
raving imprecations, the bowlings, and the maniac gesticulations of 
an Orlando Furioso. 

Let us now glance rapidly at the probable future of the freedman 
in Louisiana, and only glance, because we are to confine ourselves 
within the limits assigned to this essay. That future will depend on 
the relative position of inferiority, equality, or superiority which the 
black race is to occupy toward the white one— three things as powerful 
to settle this question as the three mythological sisters who of yore 
wove the destinies of man. 

Should the black race not have been favored by nature with the 
same letters patent of nobility which it has granted to the white, it 
will be vain to attempt to remove the inferiority by artificial means 
Should this race inferiority be the fiat of Providence, the blacks^ 
although they should be put in possession of all the political, social' 
and civil rights which they may desire, although given, as equally as 
to the whites, the same encouragement and advantages for education 
and for the acquisition of wealth in any department of industry, will 
not keep pace with their Caucasian competitors. In that case/they 
will sink to their proper level and become the mudsills of the social 
edifice. It will be, however, an additional reason for the superior race 
to assist the inferior with increasing kindness and enlightened humanitv. 
But, in spite of this protection, the negro, in all probability, will grad- 
ually disappear. As to the hybrids, those in whom the iine of color 
no longer exists apparently will continue, as they do daily, to creep 
into the Caucasian ranks, where their traces will soon be lost sight of 
and forever obliterated. It must be kept in mind, in connection with 
this subject, that the negro hates the hybrid ; and the hybrid, despis- 
ing the negro, is more averse than the white man to associate with him, 
except for political purposes. As to the female quadroons, there are 
few of them that would not belabor with a broomstick the leveller and 
trader in new principles who should propose to them to marry a 
negro. Thereby hangs a tale, which we offer to the consideration of 
Mr. Cable. 

We cannot admit the possibility of the future superiority and 
domination of the black race over the white in Louisiana, and the 
consequent extinction of the latter ; it is too absurd. But let us sup- 
pose that both races become equal in energy, knowledge, wealth, and 
number. Should they keep systematically apart and form two dis- 
tinct camps, with no social intercourse between them, it is fearful to 
think of the inevitable consequences in the struggle that would ensue 
for power and government, and from other causes. 



202 ESSAYS— CONTROVERSIAL. 

Probably this is the state of things which Mr. Cable anticipates, as 
he believes in the equality of the races. For the purpose of averting 
those anticipated evils, we should be happy to join him heartily, in 
honest, sincere, and patriotic efforts to provide for the best possible 
means to increase the kind relations now existing between the two 
races, and secure their common welfare by the reciprocal exercise of 
lasting amity, as much as this may be within the reach of human 
power, outside of miscegenation, which Ave abhor. We are convinced 
that those relations are as harmonious as they could be under the con- 
ditions which the past has created for us, but the way to prolong their 
existence indefinitely is not by inflammatory and false descriptions of 
the present intolerable oppression of the negroes in the South — an 
oppression which, in Mr. Cable's opinion, would justify them, if they 
had Caucasian energy, to inundate the country with blood by cutting 
the throats of the white devils by whom they are tortured. "We could 
hardly trust in the correctness of our eyesight when we read his 
furious denunciations. . . . Let Mr. Cable be judged by the evidence 
furnished by himself. 

In support of the semi-cloudy position occupied by Mr. Cable, I 
transcribe the following lines from his December effusion : " We hear 
much about race instinct. The most of it, I fear, is pure twaddle. It 
may be there is such a thing. We do not know. It is not proved. 
And even if it were established, it would not be necessarily a proper 
moral guide. We subordinate instinct to society's best interests as 
apprehended in the light of reason." If we have misinterpreted Mr. 
Cable's oracular dictum, we beg to be corrected. 



MR. CABLE, THE " NEGROPHILIST." 

BY B Z. 

There are probably some of Mr. Cable's readers who have been 
suddenly startled by his Freedmaii's Case in Equity,* but to the many 
who have read carefully his previous works, his " negrophilism " was 
so apparent that he who ran might read. Throughout his writings 
crime ceases to be crime when committed by a negro, mulatto, or 
quadroon. Mme. John, in The Poulette, Mme. Delphine and her 
daughter Olive, even poor Clemence, the calas vendor, victim of the 
cowardly Grandissim.es, as well as every character of " off-white " hue, 
including those others already mentioned, are drawn with a loving- 
touch. In dealing with these Mr. Cable's peculiar gift of spoiling a 
lovable and admirable character by some ignoble or, at best, ridiculous 
trait, as shown in his delineations of the Creoles, is metamorphosed 
into an entirely opposite peculiarity. No ignorance so dense, no guilt 
so great, but that Mr. Cable finds excuses and palliating circumstances, 
nay, even absolute virtue in them. Read by the light of this last tur- 
bid and violent attack on the whole South, Mr. Cable's Ereedmari's 
Case in Equity must appear as the apotheosis of his literary labors, 
the end to which all his writings pointed. If any one questions this, 
hear Mr. Cable in the Grandissimes : " A slaver y which no Legislature 
can abolish, the slavery of caste." And again : " The quadroons want 
a great deal more than free papers can secure them. Emancipation 
before the law, though it may be a right which man has no right to 
withhold, is to them little more than a mockery until they achieve 
emancipation in the minds and goodwill of the ruling class." 

In The FreedmanJ s Case in Equity he makes the startling discovery 
that three terms of a problem being given, the result will not be a 
positive quantity, as mathematicians have so long ignorantly affirmed, 
but one of three, if not one the other, or a little of both. Having 
arrived at this admirable conclusion, it need not astonish the reader 
to find that after endeavoring so industriously to belabor the unjust 
prejudices of the South, Mr. Cable should be guilty of such damaging 
admissions as the following, taken at random from his various contri- 
butions to the Century : 

" Millions of an inferior race." 

* [Vide Century Magazine, Vol. I., 1885.] 



204 ESSA YS— CONTRO VERSIAL. 

" He (the negro) was brought to our shores a naked, brutish 
savage." 

" Moreover, twenty-eight thousand slaves and free blacks hampered 
progress by sheer dead weight." 

" Their stupid and slovenly eye-service made the introduction of 
labor-saving machines a farce." 

" The unintelligent, uneconomical black Avas unavailable in manu- 
facture." 

" The free people of color were unaspiring, corrupt, and feeble." 

And it is for this people — descendants of the " most debased races 
on the globe," who, according to Mr. Cable, learned all they knew of 
good under the lash — that Mr. Cable demands equality, not only before 
the law, but in all the social intercourse of the schoolroom and places 
of public resort, with its natural sequence, miscegenation. Mr. Cable 
pretends to laugh at this absurd vision, and, while endeavoring to tear 
down the barriers of caste, raises such puny ramparts as the gauge of 
decorum, cleanliness, and moral character of the public schools. 

Mr. Cable is affected with color-blindness, and everything is to him 
not couleur de rose, but couleur d , ebene. He cannot distinguish between 
the refined and educated descendants of a virtuous Indian princess 
and the horde of promiscuous parentage, ranging often in the same 
family through all the shades of black, brown, and yellow. Indeed, 
his virtuous heart is overpowered at the thought of the social equality 
that exists in our public schools, and he finds no better remedy for the 
evil than to introduce the negro of all shades into them, which, like a 
chemical, will send each social class to itself. 

It has been asserted that, when urged to further research on the 
subjects he handled, Mr. Cable replied, in substance, that research would 
destroy his originality. The originality — viz., absurdity of ignorance 
— is not one of Mr. Cable's discoveries, and if he confined that originality 
to the jargon which he persists in affirming Creoles use in preference 
to their native tongue, we might laugh and forgive, but when, in his 
wilful or simulated ignorance, he throws such firebrands as those con- 
tained in his Freedmaii's Case in Equity, such ignorance degenerates 
into criminality. 

Mr. Cable's sympathetic feelings are deeply moved by the heart- 
rending case of a brutal assault on a colored brother. Even if Mr. 
Cable's account is not garbled, does he live in such blissful ignorance 
of facts as never to have heard of like outrages on white men com- 
mitted by lawless persons ? 

When Mr. Cable assures the North — for we cannot suppose he 
could expect such statements to pass current in the South — that 
negroes are not allowed to ride in our cars, even when able and will- 



MR. CABLE, THE " NEGROPHILISTr 205 

ing to pay for first-class accommodations, did he not fear contradiction 
from Northern visitors to our Exposition, who must see them sharing 
in every way the same accommodations furnished the whites, provided 
their purses permit it ? 

But public conveyances are not the only subjects in which Mr. 
Cable strays from the regions of blissful ignorance to those of down- 
right misrepresentation. Pathetically supposing a change of position 
in the two races, without, however, a change of skin, Mr. Cable asks 
the white man how he would relish being always tried by a black 
jury ; and, having supposed this, triumphantly declares that he has 
proven his assertion that negroes are never tried except by juries of 
their masters. Mr. Cable goes further, and asserts that negroes are 
never put on juries. Can a misstatement for a purpose go further ? 
Mr. Cable cannot ignore the fact, that in his native city and State the 
number of colored jurors are one-third in the former and one-half in 
the latter — not merely those of mixed blood and average intellect, but 
the poorest and most ignorant class ; nor the other well-known fact, 
that negro prisoners challenge their colored brother far more than the 
white criminals. And all this, and much more, Mr. Cable says to 
arrive at the conclusion that if our penitentiaries are filled to over- 
flowing with the vicious of the once servile race, it is no proof of their 
guilt, but simply of the white man's injustice and love of gain. 

Mr. Cable is right in one particular — the colored people are becom- 
ing a great social problem, which it becomes the South to consider 
wisely ; but when he tries to make us believe that the negro before 
emancipation was a far more dangerous character, he fails completely. 
To the eternal honor of the slaves let it be said, that age, childhood, 
and defenceless womanhood were left to their keeping by soldier hus- 
bands, fathers, and sons, and that trust was seldom betrayed. But 
now what have twenty years of freedom brought about \ " Grafted 
into the citizenship of the most intelligent nation in the world" 
(Cable), they have lost those better qualities that were their crown of 
glory, and in their stead has sprung up a rich harvest of crimes almost 
unknown among them before. 



A PLEA FOE THE MODERN LANGUAGES. 

BY JOHN K. FICKLEN. 
Audi Alteram Partem. 

On the editorial page of a prominent journal, there lately* appeared 
an interesting and well-written article called A Plea for Greek. If 
the writer had contented himself with pronouncing a eulogy on the 
Greek language and literature, no one, perhaps, would have been bold 
enough to differ with him ; but, directly or indirectly, the article casts 
a slur on the so-called utilitarian studies — French, German, and pre- 
sumably English — which the writer thinks are crowding out the 
classics. That these studies, together with the " malodorous " sciences, 
have been pushing the classics to the wall is an unquestionable fact ; 
but whether this movement is a slavish pandering to the utilitarian 
time-spirit may well be questioned. 

It is unnecessary in this essay to discuss the importance of Latin 
as compared with Greek in a college curriculum. The writer of A 
Plea for Greek, however, will find it almost impossible to persuade 
scholars that " Greek is a language that is more easily acquired than 
Latin." As a student and teacher of both languages, the present 
writer enters a protest. 

Waiving this point, however, the question presents itself, whether 
the student who rejects Latin and Greek in favor even of modern 
languages (the defence of the sciences may be left to the scientists 
themselves) has necessarily set up for himself a utilitarian standard ; 
whether he is neglecting the broad field of culture in order to provide 
himself with " bread and butter." This question opens two fields of 
inquiry : First, the value of classical as compared with modern litera- 
ture ; and, secondly, the methods of instruction that are now pursued 
by our leading universities in the teaching of these two literatures. 

As to the first field of inquiry, the reader may be referred to the 
great controversy which arose in the seventeenth century, and which 
was discussed by Fontenelle, Perrault, Sir William Temple, and 
Bentley. Temple maintained that ancient literature was superior, but 
he passed over without mention the names of Shakespeare, Milton, 
and Newton among the moderns. Even if a stronger advocate than 

* [1892.] 



A PLEA FOR THE MODERN LANGUAGES. 207 

Temple now arises to champion his side, such an advocate must not 
fail to take account of the glorious literature that has been produced 
since the seventeenth century in England, France, Germany, and 
other countries. 

The writer of A Plea for Greek has quoted Macaulay's glorious 
tribute to the lasting beauty of classical literature ; the present writer 
thinks it only fair to quote another passage on the same subject from 
the same author's essay on Bacon. Macaulay is speaking about the 
boasted classical acquirements of Lady Jane Grey and Elizabeth : " In 
the time of Henry VIII. and Edward VI. a person who did not read 
Greek and Latin could read nothing, or next to nothing. ... It 
was therefore absolutely necessary that a woman should be uneducated 
or classically educated. . . . This is no longer the case. All polit- 
ical and religious controversy is now conducted in the modern lan- 
guages. The ancient tongues are used only in comments on the ancient 
writers. The great productions of Athenian and Roman genius are, 
indeed, still what they were. But, though their positive value is un- 
changed, their relative value, when compared with the whole mass of 
mental wealth possessed by mankind, has been constantly falling. 
They were the intellectual all of our ancestors. They are but a part 
of our treasures. Over what tragedy could Lady Jane Grey have 
wept, over what comedy could she have smiled, if the ancient drama- 
tists had not been in her library ? A modern reader can make shift 
without (Edijms and Medea while he possesses Othello and Hamlet. 
We are guilty, we hope, of no irreverence toward those great nations 
to which the human race owes art, science, taste, civil and intellectual 
freedom, when we say that the stock bequeathed by them to us has 
been so carefully improved that the accumulated interest now exceeds 
the principal. We believe that the books which have been written in 
the languages of Western Europe during the last two hundred and 
fifty years — translations from the ancient languages, of course, included 
— are of greater value than all the books which at the beginning of 
that period were extant in the world. When, therefore, we compare 
the acquirements of Lady Jane Grey with those of an accomplished 
young woman of our own time, we have no hesitation in awarding the 
superiorit}^ to the latter." 

Again, in his essay on Byron, Macaulay declares : " It requires no 
very profound examination to discover that the Greek dramas, often 
admirable as compositions, are, as exhibitions of human character and 
human life, far inferior to English plays of the age of Elizabeth."' 

" In point of composition and adaptation to the stage,'" says Dr. 
Price, a life-long student of Shakespeare and the Greek dramatists, 
" the Othello is superior to any other drama, ancient or modern." 



208 ESSAYS— CONTROVERSIAL. 

As to the historians, it may be conceded to the writer of A Plea for 
Greek, that Herodotus was a more charming raconteur than any 
modern historian, though, in the words of Macaulay, " he has not 
written a good history ; he is, from the first to the last chapter, an 
inventor." But the moderns are so far superior in the philosophy of 
history that Macaulay is unwilling to award the ancient historians as 
a body the palm of general superiority ; he leaves the question open. 

As to Homer and the Greek orators, it will be well for us always 
to remember the words of that profound Greek scholar and critic, 
Thomas de Quincey, " who was an unqualified asserter of the superi- 
ority of modern to ancient literature.'" " It is," he said, " a pitiable 
spectacle to a man of sense and feeling, who happens to be reall} T 
familiar with the golden treasures of his own ancestral literature, 
a spectacle which moves alternate scorn and sorrow, to see young 
people squandering their time and painful study upon writers not fit 
to unloose the shoes' latchets of many among our own compatriots ; 
making painful and remote voyages after the drossy refuse, Avhen 
the pure gold lies neglected at their feet. We engage to produce 
many scores of passages from Chaucer, not exceeding fifty to eighty 
lines, which contain more of picturesque simplicity, more tenderness, 
more fidelity to nature, more felicity of sentiment, more animation of 
narrative, and more truth of character, than can be matched in all the 
Iliad or the Odyssey. To our Jeremy Taylor, to our Sir Thomas 
Browne, there is no approach made in the Greek eloquence. For the 
intellectual qualities of eloquence, in fineness of understanding, in 
depth, and in large compass of thought, Burke far surpasses any 
orator, ancient or modern." " Burke/'' declared Macaulay, " in apti- 
tude of comprehension and richness of imagination was superior to 
other orators both ancient and modern." 

The great critics have been freely quoted because some of the 
advocates of classical studies are too prone to belittle the achieve- 
ments of modern times, and suggest in their arguments that their 
devotion to the classics has left them no time adequately to appreciate 
the glory of modern literature. The writer of A Plea for Greek, 
however, is not guilty of this fault ; he maintains only that in many 
departments — oratory, lyric, poetry, the drama — modern literature 
has not surpassed the ancient or classical. Let us concede that his 
claim is a just one. The question then rises : Is there time in our 
modern life for the study of the classics? We are aware that Mr. 
James Russell Lowell said truly that the boundaries of languages 
should not deter the true student from reading the best in every 
language ; a great work is great in whatever language it is written. 
But we repeat the question : Is there time in our modern high schools 



A PLEA FOR THE MODERN LANGUAGES. 209 

and colleges for any but special students to spend six or seven years 
in acquiring enough Greek or Latin to appreciate in the original the 
works of classical authors? Let us confine the question to America. 

However much some may regret the fact, our civilization is cer- 
tainly a practical one. The life of the average American citizen is 
full of activity ; America has not yet developed a leisure class. Still 
there is a great body of students who are seeking culture with no par- 
ticular intention of turning it into a money-making machine. They 
expect to become preachers, professors, lawyers, doctors, editors, engi- 
neers, merchants, etc. Those who intend to adopt the first two pro- 
fessions have generally in the past studied Latin and Greek, and they 
will continue to do the same in the future. They are the special 
students, and for them the colleges will always make provision. Into 
this class, to a limited extent, come the lawyers, for whose profession 
a working knowledge of Latin, gained by a two or three years' course, 
may be considered obligatory. 

As to the other students, those who intend to become scientists 
have before them a vast field in the realm of science, for which a life- 
time of diligent labor seems all too brief. Even so in other professions, 
the mastery of a wide range of knowledge is the only passport to emi- 
nence, and in the active practice of his vocation the professional man 
can hardly hope for any great leisure to devote himself to classical 
culture. 

The great mass of our students, then, are to be prepared for the 
active practice of a profession. What is the best means of accomplish- 
ing this ? Certainly not by giving them merely a technical or utilita- 
rian education. Our best colleges have recognized that specialization 
should be preceded by general culture ; but not all agree as to the 
character of this general culture. 

It is conceded, however, by the great majority, that among the 
necessary studies of a college curriculum are mathematics, chemistry, 
physics, astronomy, psychology, biology, and geology. To these scien- 
tific courses the student must add history, ancient and modern, and 
the study of the development of his own language. Though a great 
deal of work has been thus mapped out, he may still have time for 
more. But has he yet touched those works in American literature 
which constitute its chief glory ? Has he investigated the great master- 
pieces of English, French, and German literature, which, though they 
may not be superior, are admitted to be unsurpassed by the classic 
models ? 

But, it may still be claimed, there is time for all this, and also for 
the thorough. course of Latin and Greek which shall unlock the treas- 
ures of the past. Education, it is argued, is chiefly inspiration and 
14 



210 ESSA YS—CONTRO VERSIAL. 

discipline ; in the college and university we must not expect to do 
more than discipline the mind, and give the student a taste for what 
is best in literature, leaving him to pursue his work when he has 
launched out into life. Yet few of us realize how quickly our active 
lives are passing until we begin to question ourselves on the tasks we 
set before us on leaving college. Most of us find that a lifetime is all 
too short to spend upon the master-works of modern literature, espe- 
cially if we wish in some degree to keep abreast of the progress in 
science. 

It may be urged, however, that the quality, not the quantity, of 
reading is the all-important desideratum. This we readily admit to be 
a safe rule, for nothing is more dangerous than the omnivorous con- 
sumption of printed matter. But still we hold that a Avide range of 
reading in various departments of knowledge is absolutely necessary 
if the student would obtain that philosophic breadth of view which is 
the only cure for bigotry. " Beware of the one-book man ! " " Yes,'' 
it has been well answered, " beware of him, because he is sure to be 
narrow-minded and bigoted." 

But the second division of our subject presses upon us : What is 
the relative discipline to be obtained from Latin and Greek on the one 
hand, and the modern languages on the other ? Of course, this ques- 
tion cannot be settled by the mere dictum of one person. But the 
present writer, who has taught both the classics and English, firmly 
oelieves that the discipline acquired in the critical interpretation of 
Shakespeare and Burke is not inferior to that acquired in a similar 
study of Sophocles and Cicero. Surely the faculty of interpretation, 
or even divination, may be exercised on some passages of Shakespeare 
as thoroughly as on the choruses of Sophocles. Moreover, German, 
which is now a necessary instrument in the hands of every scholar, 
may be utilized as a means of comparison ; translations from German 
into English, under a skilful teacher, will illustrate the power and 
beauty of both languages. 

At least, those who maintain the superiority of the classical lan- 
guages as a means of discipline should examine the methods now 
pursued in the teaching of French, German, and English. The very 
methods so long consecrated to the teaching of Latin and Greek have 
been adopted for the modern languages, and have created a new era. 

Till within the last twenty years, the teaching of English, at least 
in our Southern colleges and universities, was what it seems to have 
been at Oxford in De Quincey's time — a dreary farce. Our students, 
therefore, were compelled to depend upon the classic culture and 
discipline. So far was this infatuation carried, that many students, 
when they were graduated, went out into life conversant with Demos- 



A PLEA FOE THE MODERN LANGUAGES. 211 

thenes, but totally ignorant of Burke ; they wrote Latin better than 
they did their mother tongue. The present writer was educated at a 
great Southern university when the course in English was a reproach 
among all the wise scholars ; and he had the pleasure of witnessing 
the dawn of a new era, when Thomas E. Price, at Randolph Macon 
College, became the great pioneer in the scientific and aesthetic teach- 
ing of English. The teachers of French and German have hastened 
to fall in line, and to demand a higher place for their specialties in 
the college curriculum. 

The " moderns " admit their debt to the classical studies, but they 
maintain that it was in the necessity of things that they contracted 
this debt. Their claim now is that the new order of things must 
receive recognition ; that, even admitting the classical literature to be 
the equivalent in value of the modern, the present methods of treat- 
ing the modern languages place these languages in a new position. 
Under the old regime a full allowance of time was naturally demanded 
for the classics — even to the manifest neglect of the mother tongue. 
With the progress of the sciences and with the improved methods of 
teaching, this time is no longer at the disposal of the classics; it 
should be consecrated to those noble vehicles of modern thought, the 
languages of England, Germany, and France, and to that portion of 
modern literature which has been unsurpassed in the world's history. 

As to the discipline, the " moderns " lay stress upon the dictum of 
James Eussell Lowell, " that master of style to whom language courte- 
sied as to its natural master." In one of his last essays he declares : 
"I value Shakespeare above all for this : that for those who know no 
language but their own, there is as much intellectual training to be got 
from the study of his works as from those of any, I had almost said of 
all, great authors of antiquity." 

He who defends the study of the sciences, moreover, is justified in 
protesting strongly when his defence is dubbed "bread-and-butter 
theory " or a pandering to the utilitarian. 

Science, like anything else, may be taught by shallow and superficial 
methods ; but if we demand the " enlightened methods," there should 
be no danger of a utilitarian bias. It is now admitted that every true 
scientist, as a requisite to success, must be possessed of imagination in 
a high degree. He is ever reclaiming new territory from the realm 
of the undiscovered. Such a teacher will guide the student beyond 
secondary causes back to the Deity himself. If this high office per- 
mits him to stoop to the demands of the practical, it is to alleviate 
physical conditions and raise his followers to higher planes of thought 
and life. No Stoic, telling his disciples that all misfortunes must be 
borne with calm fortitude, can be compared in greatness with the 



2 1 2 ESSA YS—CONTEO VERSIA L. 

modern philosopher who uses science as the handmaid of right living. 
Modern science, rightly studied, walks hand in hand with philosophy. 
Its broad reach is exemplified in the immortal and reverent words of 
Kepler, as he swept the heavens with his telescope : " I read God's 
thoughts after him." 

To say, then, that those who advocate the modern languages and 
science in preference to the classics are pandering to the utilitarian, 
rather than to the ideal, is to ignore the noble philosophy taught by our 
modern authors and the aid this philosophy has drawn from science. 

But it is claimed that any true understanding of modern literature 
is dependent upon a knowledge of the classics ; for our writers, espe- 
cially the poets of the nineteenth century, use freely classical allusions 
and classical terms. As to the allusions, can it be for a moment main- 
tained that translations of the classics will not furnish all the expla- 
nations necessary for the study of modern literature ? The apprecia- 
tion of our literature shown by many a cultivated woman among us, 
who has never studied either Latin or Greek, can be cited in evidence. 
Surely the ordinary student may be excused for contenting him- 
self with translations, when it is remembered that the acquisition of 
enough Greek to catch the spirit of the dramas of Sophocles and the 
philosophic history of Thucydides is a matter of some seven years' 
study (such is Macaulay's estimate), and that so long a devotion 
to Greek must interfere with his study of either the sciences or the 
modern languages. 

As to the use of classical terminology, the present writer joins 
De Quincey in his admiration of the simplicity of old Dan Chaucer. 
However happy our modern poets may have been in the use of 
learned terms, it may be well maintained their true greatness rests, 
and has always rested, upon the noble simplicity with which they 
have interpreted the thoughts and feelings of human nature. 

To the general student, therefore, this advice might well be given : 
As you must choose between the ancient and the modern languages, 
choose rather to saturate your mind with the masterpieces of the 
modern world, remembering always that, though you may not be able 
to study the language of the ancients, you are not wholly debarred 
from appreciating their works. William Cullen Bryant is no mean 
interpreter of Homer, and Jowett no mean interpreter of Plato. The 
greatest master of thought and expression that England ever pro- 
duced contented himself with translations, and knew " small Latin 
and less Greek." 



PART III. 

ESSAYS. 

SECTION II. MIXED. 



THE HUMMING-BIRD.* 

BY JOHN J. AUDUBON. 

[John James Audubon was born near New Orleans, May 4, 1780. At an early age 
he was sent to France to be educated. In 1800 — on a farm near Philadelphia, given to 
him by his father— he began that series of drawings of birds imperishably connected 
with his name. From 1811 to 1826, a wanderer from one State to another as his scien- 
tific needs drew him, he explored the Southern forests for their ornithological treasures. 
In 1826 he went to England with his sketches, hoping to find in that country the means 
to publish the Birds of America. Being successful, the initial volume of that work 
appeared in 1830, the fifth and last in 1839. In 1846 he began the publication of a 
companion work on the Quadrupeds of America, the last volume of which did not 
appear until after his death. Europe was, through her highest names, generous to his 
appeal for recognition. Of his work Cuvier said: " C'est le plus magnifique monument 
que L'Art ait encore eleve a la Nature." Audubon died near New York, January 27, 
1851.] 

Where is the person who, on seeing this lovely little creature 
moving on humming winglets through the air, suspended as if by 
magic in it, flitting from one flower "to another, with motions as grace- 
ful as they are light and airy, pursuing its course over our extensive 
continent, and yielding new delights wherever it is seen ; where is the 
person, I ask of you, kind reader, who, on observing this glittering 
fragment of the rainbow, would not pause, admire, and instantly turn 
his mind with reverence toward the Almighty Creator, the wonders 
of whose hand we at every step discover, and of whose sublime con- 
ceptions we everywhere observe the manifestations in his admirable 
system of creation ? There breathes not such a person ; so kindly 
have we all been blessed with that intuitive and noble feeling — 
admiration ! 

No sooner has the returning sun again introduced the vernal 
season, and caused millions of plants to expand their leaves and 
blossoms to his genial beams, than the little humming-bird is seen 
advancing on fairy wings, carefully visiting every opening flower-cup, 
and, like a curious florist, removing from each the injurious insects 
that otherwise would ere long cause their beauteous petals to droop 
and decay. Poised in the air, it is observed peeping cautiously, and 
with sparkling eye, into their innermost recesses, whilst the ethereal 
motions of its pinions, so rapid and so light, appear to fan and cool 
the flower, without injuring its fragile texture, and produce a delight- 

* [Birds of America.'] 



210 ESS A YS—31IXED. 

ful murmuring sound, well adapted for lulling the insects to repose. 
Then is the moment for the humming-bird to secure them. Its long, 
delicate bill enters the cup of the flower, and the protruded double- 
tubed tongue, delicately sensible, and imbued with a glutinous saliva, 
touches each insect in succession, and draws it from its lurking place, 
to be instantly swallowed. All this is done in a moment, and the 
bird, as it leaves the flower, sips so small a portion of its liquid honey, 
that the theft, we may suppose, is looked upon with a grateful feeling 
by the flower, which is thus kindly relieved from the attacks of her 
destroj^ers. 

The prairies, the fields, the orchards and gardens, nay, the deepest 
shades of the forests, are all visited in their turn, and everywhere the 
little bird meets with pleasure and with food. Its gorgeous throat in 
beauty and brilliancy baffles all competition. Now it glows with a 
fiery hue, and again it is changed to the deepest velvety black. The 
upper parts of its delicate body are of resplendent changing green ; 
and it throws itself through the air with a swiftness and vivacity 
hardly conceivable. It moves from one flower to another like a gleam 
of light, upwards, downwards, to the right, and to the left. In this 
manner it searches the extreme northern portions of our country, 
following with great precaution the advances of the season, and re- 
treats with equal care at the approach of autumn. 

I wish it were in my power at this moment to impart to you, kind 
reader, the pleasures which I have felt whilst watching the move- 
ments, and viewing the manifestation of feelings displayed by a single 
pair of these most favorite little creatures, when engaged in the 
demonstration of their love to each other : — how the male swells his 
plumage and throat, and, dancing on the wing, whirls around the 
delicate female ; how quickly he dives towards a flower, and returns 
with a loaded bill, which he offers to her to whom alone he feels 
desirous of being united ; how full of ecstasy he seems to be when his 
caresses are kindly received ; how his little wings fan her, as they fan 
the flowers, and he transfers to her bill the insect and the honey 
which he has procured with a view to please her ; how these attentions 
are received with apparent satisfaction ; how, soon after, the blissful 
compact is sealed ; how, then, the courage and care of the male are 
redoubled ; how he even dares to give chase to the tyrant fly-catcher, 
hurries the blue-bird and the martin to their boxes ; and how, on sound- 
ing pinions, he joyously returns to the side of his lovely mate. Reader, 
all these proofs of the sincerity, fidelity, and courage with which the 
male assures his mate of the care he will take of her while sitting on 
her nest, may be seen, and have been seen, but cannot be portrayed or 
described. 



THE HUMMING-BIRD. 217 

Could you, kind reader, cast a momentary glance on the nest of 
the humming-bird, and see, as I have seen, the newly hatched pair 
of young, little larger than humble-bees, naked, blind, and so feeble as 
scarcely to be able to raise their little bill to receive food from the 
parents ; and could you see those parents, full of anxiety and fear, 
passing and repassing within a few inches of your face, alighting on a 
twig not more than a yard from your body, waiting the result of your 
unwelcome visit in a state of the utmost despair, — you could not fail 
to be impressed with the deepest pangs which parental affection feels 
on the unexpected death of a cherished child. Then how pleasing is 
it, on your leaving the spot, to see the returning hope of the parents, 
when, after examining the nest, they find their nurslings untouched ! 
You might then judge how pleasing it is to a mother of another kind, 
to hear the physician who has attended her sick child assure her that 
the crisis is over, and that her babe is saved. These are the scenes 
best fitted to enable us to partake of sorrow and joy, and to determine 
every one who views them to make it his study to contribute to the 
happiness of others, and to refrain from wantonly or maliciously 
giving them pain. 



THE WOOD THRUSH.* 



BY JOHN J. AUDUBON. 



This bird is ray greatest favorite of the feathered tribes of our 
woods. To it I owe much. How often has it revived my drooping 
spirits, when I have listened to its wild notes in the forest, after passing a 
restless night in my slender shed, so feebly secured against the violence 
of the storm, as to show me the futility of my best efforts to rekindle 
my little fire, whose uncertain and vacillating light had gradually died 
away under the destructive weight of the dense torrents of rain that 
seemed to involve the heavens and the earth in one mass of fearful 
murkiness, save when the red streaks of the flashing thunderbolt burst 
on the dazzled eye, and, glancing along the huge trunk of the stateliest 
and noblest tree in my immediate neighborhood, were instantly fol- 
lowed by an uproar of crackling, crashing, and deafening sounds, roll- 
ing their volumes in tumultuous eddies far and near, as if to silence the 
very breathings of the unformed thought ! How often, after such a 
night, when far from my dear home, and deprived of the presence of 
those nearest to my heart, wearied, hungry, drenched, and so lonely 
and desolate as almost to question myself why I was thus situated ; 
when I have seen the fruits of my labors on the eve of being destroyed, 
as the water, collected into a stream, rushed through my little camp, 
and forced me to stand erect, shivering in a cold fit like that of a severe 
ague ; when I have been obliged to wait with the patience of a mar- 
tyr for the return of da}^ silently counting over the years of my youth, 
doubting perhaps if ever again I should return to my home and 
embrace my family! — how often, as the first glimpses of morning 
gleamed doubtfully amongst the dusky masses of the forest-trees, has 
there come upon my ear, thrilling along the sensitive cords which 
connect that organ with the heart, the delightful music of this har- 
binger of day ! — and how fervently, on such occasions, have I blessed 
the Being who formed the wood thrush, and placed it in those soli- 
tary forests, as if to console me amidst my privations, to cheer my 
depressed mind, and to make me feel, as I did, that man never should 
despair, whatever may be his situation, as he can never be certain that 
aid and deliverance are not at hand. 

The wood thrush seldom commits a mistake, after such a storm as 

* [Birds of America.] 



THE WOOD THRUSH. 21>9 

glau.lening ra .v s from beneath 'the Start horizon f P i'? ™ 

«le oechvities, ami "^ ^ £££ XnTTI °? ^ ^ 
favorite resorts. There it is that tl 1, . l ,enetrate . are its 

the woods must be h^^£^^« * 



THE MOCKING-BIRD.* 

BY JOHN J. AUDUBON. 

It is where the great magnolia shoots up its majestic trunk, 
crowned with evergreen leaves, and decorated with a thousand beau- 
tiful flowers that perfume the air around ; where the forests and fields 
are adorned with blossoms of every hue; where the golden orange 
ornaments the gardens and the groves; where bignonias of various 
kinds interlace their climbing stems around the white-flowered stu- 
artia, and mounting still higher, cover the summits of the lofty trees 
around, accompanied with innumerable vines that here and there fes- 
toon the dense foliage of the magnificent woods, lending to the vernal 
breeze a slight portion of the perfume of their clustered flowers ; where 
a genial warmth seldom forsakes the atmosphere ; where berries and 
fruits of all descriptions are met with at every step— in a word, it is 
where Nature seems to have paused as she passed over the earth, and 
opening her stores to have strewed with unsparing hand the diversified 
seeds from which have sprung all the beautiful and splendid forms 
which I should in vain attempt to describe, that the mocking-bird 
should have fixed its abode, there only that its wondrous song should 
be heard. 

But where is that favored land ? It is in that great continent to 
whose distant shores Europe has sent forth her adventurous sons, to 
wrest for themselves a habitation from the wild inhabitants of the 
forest, and to convert the neglected soil into fields of exuberant fertil- 
ity. It is, reader, in Louisiana that these bounties of Nature are in the 
greatest perfection. It is there that you should listen to the love song 
of the mocking-bird, as I at this moment do. See how he flies round 
his mate, with motions as light as those of the butterfly ! His tail is 
widely expanded, he mounts in the air to a small distance, describes a 
circle, and, again alighting, approaches his beloved one, his eyes gleam- 
ing with delight, for she has already promised to be his, and his only. 
His beautiful wings are gently raised, he bows to his love, and, again 
bouncing upwards, opens his bill and pours forth his melod}^, full of 
exultation at the conquest which he has made. 

They are not the soft sounds of the flute or the hautboy that I 
hear, but the sweeter notes of Nature's own music. The mellowness 

[* Birds of America.] 



THE MOCKING-BIRD. 221 

of the song, the varied modulations and gradations, the extent of its 
compass, the great brilliancy of execution, are unrivalled. There is 
probably no bird in the world that possesses all the musical qualifica- 
tions of this king of song, who has derived all from Nature's self. 
Yes, reader, all ! 

No sooner has he again alighted, and the conjugal contract has 
been sealed, than, as if his breast was about to be rent with delight, 
he again pours forth his notes with more softness and richness than 
before. He now soars higher, glancing around with a vigilant eye, to 
assure himself that none has witnessed his bliss. When these love 
scenes are over, he dances through the air, full of animation and delight, 
and, as if to convince his lovely mate that to enrich her hopes he has 
much more love in store, he that moment begins anew, and imitates 
all the notes which Nature has imparted to the other songsters of the 
grove. 

******** 

The musical powers of this bird have often been taken notice of by 
European naturalists, and persons who find pleasure in listening to 
the song of different birds whilst in confinement or at large. Some of 
these persons have described the notes of the nightingale as occasion- 
ally fully equal to those of our bird. I have frequently heard both 
species, in confinement and in the wild state, and without prejudice 
have no hesitation in pronouncing the notes of the European philomel 
equal to those of a soubrette of taste, which, could she study under a 
Mozart, might perhaps in time become very interesting in her way. 
But to compare her essays to the finished talent of the mocking-bird 
is, in my opinion, quite absurd. 



THE RELATION BETWEEN THE LITERATURES OF 
GREECE AND HIKDOSTAN. 

BY ALEXANDER DIMITRY. 

[Alexander Dimitry was born in New Orleans, February 7, 1805. Soon after he 
had taken his B. A. degree at Georgetown College, he became the first English editor of 
the New Orleans Bee, a paper published up to that time exclusively in French. In 1834 
lie was appointed clerk in the General Post Office Department at Washington City. In 
1842 he returned to Louisiana and organized the free school system in that State, and 
was for about three years State Superintendent of Public Education. In 1856 he was 
appointed translator in the State Department at Washington, and three years later 
accepted the United States Ministership to Costa Rica and Nicaragua. In 1861 he 
resigned this position to embrace the Southern cause, and under the Confederate Govern- 
ment he was Chief of the Finance Bureau in the Post Office Department. In 1868 lie 
was made Assistant Superintendent of the New Orleans public schools, and in 1870 he 
was elected Professor of Ancient Languages in the Christian Brothers' College at Pass 
Christian, Miss. In the prime of life he had prepared an elaborate History of English 
Names, the manuscript of which was destroyed by a fire at the St. Charles Institute of 
St. Charles Parish, La., of which he was at the time principal. Shortly after his death, 
which occurred January 30, 1883, his friend James R. Randall, the Southern poet, said : 
" This country has given birth to few men who could compare with Professor Dimitry in 
talent, scholarship, and accomplishments. He was a linguist, an orator, and a master of 
composition. Men with not the hundredth part of his ability have risen in public life 
and made something of a display. There was something absent from the Professor's 
nature that meaner creatures possess and utilize, and so his grand Grecian form and 
intellect pass away almost without a sign, so far as this world is concerned; but I think 
he must, in another realm, hold high converse with Socrates, and hear from the lips of 
Homer the undying song of Troy."] 

The people of Hindostan, a mild, pliant, and poetic race, charac- 
terized by deep sympathies with mankind, enacted an important part 
in the drama of Eastern civilization. Whatever may have been its 
relations with Egypt and Greece, with Persia and China — whether it 
have modified their ideas, undergone their influences, or benefited by 
an exchange of thought between those regions and the Hindostanic 
peninsula — it is now admitted that the earliest sketchings of civilization 
are traced in the Sanscrit books. A century has scarcely passed by 
since the labors of Anquetil, enlarged by those of Jones and Cole- 
brooke, have revealed them to the world ; and their study brings a 
sense of astonishment and awe over the mind as it explores their mys- 
teries. Fancy wanders amid those subterranean temples, which the 
waters of the Ganges threaten with hourly invasion— the gigantic 
monuments of days gone by, of which the living generation know 





ALEX \NDEK DIMITKV. 



THE LITERATURES OF GREECE AND I1IND0STAN. 223 

neither the uses nor names — monuments reared without order, economy, 
or rule, lofty creations of art, groaning under a wild luxuriance of 
artistic ornaments — marble riddles which we cannot read, bristling 
with forests of columns and hosts of statues, which at once recall the 
idea of Egypt and Persia, Greece and Mexico. Of the architecture of 
that race, the literature, in its inconceivably vast range, is no unfit 
counterpart. Epic or tragedy ; ode and apologue ; sophisms of the 
school and dreams of the imagination ; the richest manifestations of 
human intelligence and the most drivelling systems of moral philoso- 
phy ; the doctrines of materialism, in its naked forms, or its disguise 
under the many-hued mantle of pantheism ; the tenets of a high- 
reaching materialism or the elevation of the senses into a system of 
worship ; the application of logic to the purposes of practical life and 
to the criticism of the arts, a style of narrative composition as terse, 
lyrical, and sententious as that of the Bible itself — all these charac- 
teristics are wildly, incoherently blended together, and constitute a 
strangely magnificent body of literature, probably older than that of 
Greece. There is no form of the human mind, as it revealed itself in 
antiquity, but what is bound in the mysterious chains of the hundred 
thousand distichs of the Mahdrbaratta, which is the Iliad of Hindo- 
stan, or in the epic grandeur of the fiamayana, which bears a singular 
affinity to the Odyssey of Homer. 

This poetry of Oriental antiquity, is toned to an astonishing grand- 
eur of ideas and a vigorous power of creation. Luxuriant in its forms 
and hues, sparkling with the very sunshine of the rich climes in which 
it grew, it unfolds its beauties with all the splendor and magnificence 
of the early Edens of the world, and like their deep and mysterious 
rivers, wheels its broad tide into the shoreless and fathomless oceans 
of immensity. Its character is one of wonderful variety — colossal in 
its proportions, yet minute in its details. The mind is called not un- 
frequently to dwell on most singularly striking contrasts. On one 
page, we linger on a picture of a perishing world beside that of a 
smiling infant. The poet, on one page, sports with a delicate flower 
bending its petals under the weight of a single dew-drop ; whilst on 
the next he marshals all the Hindoo gods to battle in the illimitable 
fields of space. Whilst legions of spirits of darkness and hosts of 
monstrous giants attempt to quench the glories of the sun, and to 
devour the very earth itself, a child comes forth with the magic 
flower of the lotus in his hand, and the flower rebukes the attempt 
of the dark spirits, and subdues the mad endeavors of the brood of 
Titans. This world of poetical illusion and witchcraft is unfolded 
with matchless ingenuity by the Sanscrit poet. In these battles of 
the mid-air, in which heaven and earth are witnesses of the giant 



224: ESSAYS— MIXED. 

fights, he arms his agents with varied instruments of destruction — a 
thousand spirits dealing round, in their aerial course, lightning and 
death ; cohorts of elephants, mounted by the followers of Ormuzd, the 
spirit of light, crushing down the legions of Arimanhes, the spirit of 
evil. Here, the sense of terror, wound up to its highest expression ; 
there, the language of feeling and love, appealing in the gentlest tones. 
Here, deformity in its most ideal hideousness ; there, beauty wrapped 
up in the gorgeousness of divinity itself — everywhere a spirit of 
religious symbolism, a train of wildest allegories, under which the 
mind of modern days cowers in vain efforts to unravel the mystic 
web ! The llaha-baratta, or, as it means, the Greek war, set forth 
in that monument of modern erudition, the Asiatic Researches of 
Calcutta, relates the strife of the gods with the heroes and giants of 
earth, that common tradition which Ave find running through the 
poetical origins of all the nations of antiquity; while the Ra/ma/yana, 
or the exploits of the Hero, of a more human character in its concep- 
tion and execution, though still tinged with symbolism, sings of Rama, 
the great Hindoo Hero, the conqueror of the southern portion of the 
peninsula, whose exploits, glory, exile, and woes the poet rehearses in 
a strain not unworthy of Homer's harp. 

Still in this wonderful literature of Hindostan, the scholar looks 
in vain for the severe yet elegant proportions of Grecian art ; though 
he is compelled to acknowledge the very close relationship which evi- 
dently exists between them. If he attempt to trace up the historical 
causes of this intellectual kindred, the mind is suddenly merged in 
rayless obscurity, and left to the questionable help of suppositions, 
which, however ingenious, lack the ground of well-established facts. 
From this period of Brahminic civilization, for the want of records, 
we pass suddenly, without any gradual transitions or blending of 
ideas, to the era of Grecian polity. There, like a radiant star, glitters 
the golden link which binds Asia to Europe — the East to the West — 
the newer eras of society to the primitive ages of the world. The 
traditions of the relation which must have existed between India and 
the Pelasgic tribes, which first settled Greece, are now irrevocably 
lost ; the traces of their journey ings have been buried under the accu- 
mulated dust of centuries ; but we possess the story of our affiliation 
with ancient Greece and of our connection with her splendid system 
of civilization. Clearly Oriental in her national origin, and half so in 
her geographical position, Greece lighted the torch of that civilization 
which through many a trial has passed from Europe to our shores. 
Though ignorant of what she may have owed earlier nations, Ave 
know the amount of our indebtedness to her. However largely she 
may have borrowed from her predecessors, still her special genius 



THE LITERATURES OF GREECE AND HINDOSTAN. 2?5 

remains undiminished, a genius worth}- of the admiration of yet 
unreckoned centuries. Her literature is one of beauty, of power, and 
of harmony, resting upon an equilibrium of all the faculties of the 
intellect, the secrets of which were exclusively her own — not to be 
found in the symbols of Egypt and of India, in the brutal majesty 
of the Persian and Arabic schools, or in even the high inspiration of 
the Hebrew books. The temple of pure art she opened, and for the 
first time opened, to the true worship of intellect. Beauty throws her 
halo over its creations ; the excesses of Oriental luxuriance are sub- 
dued ; the narration of facts, the reverses of states, the triumphs of 
nations, put on a lucid and logical form ; the passions have their own 
expression of eloquence and speak the language, feelings, and thoughts 
of humanity ; the precision of history is divorced from the enthusiasm 
and the vagueness of lyrical composition, in which the early annals of 
nations were once couched. The forms of intellect, of that which had 
been abstract intellect, assume a completeness and a purity hitherto 
unknown. Passing over the first period, barely known through the 
fragments that have come to us, of Linus, Orpheus, Musaeus, and other 
priestly bards, we find this great development of mind coeval with 
the advent of old Homer. Homer is, to this day, the sovereign mas- 
ter of epic poetry, and no hand has been able as yet to discrown this 
monarch of song in his intellectual reign of thirty centuries ! He 
was the first representative of the freedom of intellect, upspringing in 
energy and in power, after having bowed so long to the tyranny of 
symbolism wielded by the hand of the cunning priesthood ! A more 
splendid pageant is not spread on the page of history than this specta- 
cle of the first outburst of purely human will and human power exert- 
ing its influence on mankind. Where are the Hindoo symbols? 
Where are the gods in this pageantry ! I see around it men of flesh 
and blood — men of strong individuality towering up into heroic dimen- 
sions. I hear Ajax praying away the darkness, and daring Olympus 
itself to the utterance, if it but consents to give him light ! I see the 
fierce Diomedes, thundering in his war chariot, on the battle-plain of 
Troy — fronting the divinities of Olympus in deadly fight, I see him 
feed his ruthless lance with the immortal blood of the immortal Mars 
— and I feel, you feel, and every one feels, that Homer, on that day, 
proclaimed the dignity of human nature, rescued it from the subduing 
traditions of the past, and foreshadowed, in undying song, the glorious 
progress of the future ! 



THE PERIOD OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG 
THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 

BY ROBERT SHARP. 

[Robert Sharp was born in Lawrenceville, Va., October 24, 1852. He was gradu- 
ated from Randolph Macon College, in that State, in 1876, with the degree of A.M., 
and from the University of Leipsic, in Germany, in 1879, with the degree of Ph.D. In 
1880 he was elected Professor of Greek and English in the University of Louisiana, in 
New Orleans ; and when that institution was merged into the Tulane University, he 
was elected to the same position. This position he still holds. He is the author of 
a Treatise on the Use of the Infinitive in Herodotus, written in Latin, and published 
at Leipsic, and of various articles and book-reviews in journals of education, and of 
some miscellaneous contributions to the newspapers. He is co-editor with James A. 
Harrison, of Washington and Lee University, of Beowulf, an old English poem, with 
Glossary and Notes, now in the fourth edition.] 

No history of a people can be even approximately complete with- 
out a delineation, as clear as it may be made, of the every-day life of 
the individuals and classes that make up that people. A great number 
of details are necessary to render this picture even nearly adequate. 
The family life, the house, the mode of dress, the character of the 
food, the occupations, the education, the civil and social relations, the 
religion — all these and many other things must be reproduced as 
faithfully as is possible in the circumstances of each case. When this 
has been accomplished, we are able to comprehend what manner of 
people we have to do with ; and now, first, are we prepared to read 
and understand their history. 

Trustworthy information for this description of the early periods 
of a nation's life is often extremely difficult to obtain. A scrap is 
found here, and a scrap there ; now in the meagre entries of early 
chronicles, now in the casual allusions of home contemporary writers, 
if such exist, or in the observations of outsiders, if such fortunately 
survive. The pick and shovel of the modern excavator and the 
researches of the philologist may furnish their quota. These bits of 
evidence, when severely tested and found reliable, are pieced together, 
and thus the more or less complete picture unfolds itself to our view. 

A peculiar interest attends our investigation, when we attempt 
to discover what was the part played by the young, by the children 
and youth, of an ancient people. The importance of children to a 
community is, perhaps, generally recognized. A crusty few may only 



CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 227 

tolerate them ; but the larger number of people, either from the rosy 
reminiscences of their own childhood, or from loving association with 
their own or with others' children, have a soft place in their hearts 
for the little folk, of whatever time, place, or race. There are few in 
the retrospect of whose lives a child's prattle does not somewhere 
echo with its simple, sweet, humanizing music. The musty etymolo- 
gist, as he digs up the bones of dead words, wears a gentler expression 
when he unearths a specimen which gives him a glimpse into pre- 
historic child-life. The dusty archaeologist, when he finds a grotesque 
terra-cotta doll, worn and broken, looks positively human, as he calls 
up, in imagination, the chubby young ancient that loved, fondled, and 
maimed the toy in his hand. 

If, then, we may assume a general interest in the child, his ways, 
and his bringing up, in the history of every people, I am sure we must 
feel a peculiar interest in all that throws any light upon the career of 
the young people among the Anglo-Saxons, from the time of their 
entrance upon the stage, through all the scenes and acts — sometimes 
it is comedy, sometimes it is tragedy — to' the time of their exit into 
manhood and womanhood, when haply they survive so long. This 
is a family matter for most of us ; for these same Anglo-Saxon young- 
sters were, or were to be, our ancestors ; and, when we succeed in 
calling them up for inspection by the mind's eye, we look upon them 
with a proprietary interest. 

AVe shall not, however, be able to produce a complete delineation 
of child-life among the Anglo-Saxons. Our authorities fail us at many 
points in a most disappointing way, and the information that we have 
refers, for the most part, only to male children and youth. We 
depend almost entirely upon the writings of the Anglo-Saxons them- 
selves, and they, of course, did not appreciate the exceeding interest 
to posterity of the details they omitted. Contemporary foreign 
writers can help us but little, as, in the earlier period, few or none 
of them seem to have known anything of the Anglo-Saxons at home. 
Art has left us no suggestions, either in stone or on canvas, for the 
excellent reason that there was no Anglo-Saxon art of a character to 
be of assistance to us. 

The facts here presented have been collected from many sources. 
In some parts I have culled from the pages of modern writers, in some 
instances I have found valuable materials in Anglo-Saxon texts and 
in the publications of the Early English Text Society. I would men- 
tion as having been especially helpful, Thrupp's Anglo-Saxon Home, 
Sharon Turner's History of the Anglo-SaaeoThS, Kemble's Anglo-Saxon 
Dialogues, and Bede's writings. 

Beginning with the child at his earliest appearance, we find that, 



228 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

in the opinion of the Anglo-Saxons, it was of the highest importance 
that he should be born upon a lucky day. The first day of the moon 
was a most fortunate day ; for the child born upon that day was sure 
to live long and prosper. The second day was not so propitious ; as 
the child born on that day would grow fast, but would die young. He 
who was born on the fourth day of the moon was destined to excel in 
matters of state ; he who was born on the tenth would be a great 
traveller. But the twenty-first was the best day of all for a birth- 
day, since he who began life upon that day would become a bold and 
successful marauder. 

Of the week-days, in Christian times, Sunday was most to be 
recommended as a natal day, and Friday was the most unfortunate 
of all ; for on the latter day came the crucifixion ; and Adam ate the 
forbidden fruit, he was expelled from Paradise, and descended into 
hell — all on Friday.* 

In the earliest times, the Anglo-Saxon parent had absolute power 
of life or death over the child, or, if life was granted it, of enslaving 
it. Thus the first dilemma that faced the child after birth was, or 
might prove to be, a grave one : should it be allowed to live, or not ? 
The Anglo-Saxons held that it was not only permissible, but even a 
virtue and a sign of love on the part of the parents, to put to death, 
directly or indirectly, any child born with physical defects. Thus 
they and many other peoples of antiquity anticipated and went beyond 
Malthus of later times. It seems doubtful, indeed, whether infanticide 
was considered a crime under any circumstances. Michelet, in his 
On 'gines du Droit Frcmqais, says : " ' A child cries,' they said, ' when 
it comes into the world, for it anticipates its wretchedness. It is well 
for it that it should die.' " This sinister view of the Franks seems to 
have prevailed generally among the Northern nations, and was due, it 
is likely, in a great measure to the rigors of the climate and the many 
miseries attendant upon the struggle for existence in the barbarous 
state. 

With the change from a life of piracy and marauding to one more 
settled, came a decrease in this custom of murdering the innocents. 
But at first the change of view was of small advantage to the unfor- 
tunate little ones ; for it seems that the practice of actually putting 
the child to death merely gave place to that of exposing it in the 
forest or upon the heath to take its chance with hunger, cold, wild 
beast, and passing stranger. 

If it was useless and perhaps criminal to rear a weakling, it was 
even worse to bring up a timid child, which later, as a coward among 
brave men, would bring disgrace upon its kin. To determine, there- 
* Cp. Kemble's Anglo-Saxon Dialogues : Solomon and Saturn. 



CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 



229 



fore, whether a child suspected of timidity was entitled to live, he was 
put 'to some test. He was, for instance, placed in some dangerous 
position, as upon the bough of a tree or upon a high roof. If the 
little one showed by laughing and crowing that he enjoyed his peril- 
ous position, he was saved ; if he showed signs of fear, he was doomed, 
and he was exposed without mercy. No comment can add to, nor 
lessen, the horror of the bare statement of these facts. When once 
the parent had recognized the child's right to life, especially by the 
act of giving it food, he might never afterwards slay it. 

With the progress from barbarism towards enlightenment came the 
gradual abandonment of this custom in all its forms. Better organized 
government, and the recognition of sounder principles of political 
economy, worked together with the humanizing influence of the Church 
to accomplish this end, and finally put an end to the slaughter of the 

children. 

The wise King Ina offered a fixed reward to him who should adopt 
a child that had been exposed, the amount varying with the rank of 
the child. For a ceorl's child, the foster-parent received, each year, 
six shillings, a cow in summer, and an ox in winter. The adoption of 
the child of the proprietor of ten hides of land brought, for each year, 
ten pots of honey, three hundred loaves of bread, twelve measures of 
Welsh ale, thirty of clear ale, two oxen, ten sheep, ten geese, twenty 
hens, ten cheeses, a measure of butter, five salmon, twenty pounds of 
fodder, and last, but not least, one hundred eels. This appetizing 
stipend was supposed to repay the new parent for his trouble and ex- 
pense. Indeed, one would think that such waifs would have been at 
a premium. This compensation was continued until the child was 
supposed to be able, by its labor, to contribute an equivalent of the 
expense of its support.* 

When the Anglo-Saxons became cultivators of the soil, the adopted 
children were made to earn their salt, and, it may be, even more ; and 
farmers were observed to be especially inclined to have pity on the 
little foundlings, and to take them in. Thrupp remarks, with much 
point : " From this period infanticide became not only a crime but an 
extravagance." That the adopted children were often cruelly treated 
goes without saying ; but the Church and the Government were the 
friends of the little folk, and with time their condition improved. 

A hideous consequence of the unlimited power of the parent over 
the child was the practice of selling it into slavery. The Anglo-Saxon 
father had, at first, the privilege of selling his child whenever he 
pleased ; but this power was afterwards restricted, and he was allowed 
to do so onLy under the pressure of absolute necessity. " In case of 
* See Ellis : Doomsday Book, vol. i. p. 128, cited by Thrupp. 



230 ESS A YS—3IIXED. 

extreme want,' 1 says an old Frisian law, cited by Thrupp, " when the 
child is naked as a worm, and without a roof, when the black fog and 
the cold winter reach her, then may the mother sell her child.'" 

The Church steadily opposed this custom from the first, and, with 
the aid of more humane rulers, eventually abolished it. But at first 
it could only impose limitations. Theodore, second Archbishop of 
Canterbury (668), ruled that a father, if pressed by great difficulties, 
might sell a son who was under the age of seven, and a daughter — in 
marriage — up to the age of fourteen. Beyond this they might not be 
sold at all. Archbishop Eegbert, about eighty years later, grudgingly 
renewed the permission, but declared that whoever availed himself of 
it deserved excommunication. 

During the earlier period, the child might be sold in payment of 
penalties incurred by his father. But from the beginning of the 
tenth century no child under ten could be punished for his father's 
crimes, nor one over ten unless he had partaken of the offence. King 
Canute (1020) referred with indignation to the ancient custom of sell- 
ing the child into slavery for the father's crimes, " as it lay in the 
cradle, before it had even tasted meat, it being held by the covetous 
to be equally guilty as if it had discretion." 

The custom of putting children out to nurse prevailed ; and it 
seems that it was a matter of common occurrence for them to be 
brutally treated. So much so, that King Alfred found it necessary to 
decree * that, when a child put out to nurse died, the nurse was to be 
presumed guilty of its death till she could prove her innocence — a stern 
measure for the prevention of cruelty to children. 

The domestic nurse was an exceedingly important personage in the 
Anglo-Saxon household, as well as in other households, ancient and 
modern. She was often richly rewarded for her services, and justly, 
it would seem ; for we shall find that some of her duties went far be- 
yond her modern successor's conception of her obligations. It was 
her duty, for example, to protect the child from evil spirits. We 
know something of their methods of accomplishing this, but so little 
that it must be counted among the lost arts. Certainly the modern 
nurse seems unable to exorcise the evil spirits that sometimes take 
possession of her charge — at least, so say the cynical bachelors. 

The details of this interesting performance, as far as they are 
known, were about as follows : as soon as practicable after the birth 
of the infant, a ditch, or better, a small tunnel was dug, and then the 
little one was drawn through this, the opening by which he entered 
being carefully and effectually closed behind him with brambles and, 
perhaps, twigs ; for you must know that the evil spirits that possess 

* Laics of Alfred, c. 17. 



CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 231 

children are very sensitive to brambles — and to twigs. In process of 
time it came to be the fashion for the child's nurse to crawl through 
the tunnel vicariously, for the child, as before shutting out the pursu- 
ing spirits with the briers. This was found to be just as effective as 
when the child went through in proper person. This arrangement 
was satisfactory to all parties, and certainly added to the value and 
importance of the nurse. 

There have been various surmises as to the origin of this curious 
custom. Thrupp suggests that it is a survival of the heathen worship 
of Frija and Eortha. Another opinion is, that it was intended to 
typify the descent into the grave and the resurrection. This is proba- 
ble enough, if the practice belonged exclusively to the Christian period, 
which cannot be well proved nor disproved. 

A kind of baptism of infants was practiced in the North of Europe 
before the introduction of Christianity. Snorri Sturlusen tells, in his 
chronicle, how a Norwegian noble, who lived in the reign of Harold 
Harfagra, poured water upon the head of a man and called him Haakon 
after his father. This may, to some extent, account for the supersti- 
tion that existed at first in regard to the Christian rite. Soames, in 
The Anglo-Saxon Church, tells us that Anglo-Saxons regarded it as a 
magical ceremony for calling in a good spirit to keep out the evil ones. 

The relations existing between the god-parents, and between them 
and the god-child, were very close. The god-parents might not be 
united in marriage after the baptism, and the god-child might collect 
damages for injury done to the god-parent. 

The names given Anglo-Saxon children were, in early times, as 
were, perhaps, all names at first, either descriptive of circumstances 
connected with their birth, or significant of what it was hoped they 
might become. Sometimes they were prosaic attempts to condense 
into a single word some incident occurring at the time of the child's 
birth, or in its early history ; sometimes they were descriptive of its 
appearance. Often they were fanciful, sometimes poetic, not infre- 
quently grotesque. Often the tenderness or gratitude awakened by 
the advent of the child, as evinced in the name bestowed on it, seems 
strangely inconsistent when displayed by the people who could even 
still expose upon the desolate heath, apparently without a pang, their 
less favored offspring. 

Of course, their names ultimately became conventional ; but at first 
they were not so, and the story told by them often gives us a glimpse 
into the gentler side of the nature of these half-tamed barbarians. It 
must be admitted, however, that the love of war, and their savage 
spirit, are more frequently apparent in the names of males, as may be 
seen, for example, from the great number of names having " wolf " 



232 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

as one element. The wolf was evidently a beast of habits most con- 
genial to the tastes of our Anglo-Saxon ancestors ; and they often 
gave the young innocents names that showed the proud father's rea- 
sonable hope that his son might prove to be, in some degree, wolf -like. 
A few examples out of many are : Sigewulf, Wolf of Yictorv ; Ethel- 
wulf , Noble Wolf ; Ealdwulf , Old Wolf ; Ulph, Wolf, pure and simple. 
Then there were Egberht, Sword's Gleam ; Herberht, Glory of the 
Army, and many other warlike compounds. 

Of a more pacific character were such as Ethelberht, Noble and 
Bright ; Alfred, Elf in Council, that is, Good in Council. 

When there were more than one of the same name, other distin- 
guishing designations were added, sometimes patronymic, as Alf redson ; 
sometimes denoting the occupation, as in Osgood Stealere. Strange 
to say, " Stealere " then meant " steward ; " and the resemblance, as 
Ave of modern times know, to " stealer," was purely fortuitous. 

Surnames often grew out of personal characteristics, and such were 
added in later life. They were often comical and uncomplimentary. 
We are all familiar with Harold Harefoot, Edmund Ironsides, and 
Edith Swanneck ; and we meet with Wulfric the Pale, Thurcyl Mares- 
head, Godwin Towndog, and Ketel Flatnose. Other surnames were: 
Ugly, Squinteyed, Longbeard, Hognose, Hawknose, Spoonnose, Torch- 
nose — what a world of suggestion the last name bears !— and Yfelcild, 
Badboy. 

The names given to girls are especially interesting as affording 
evidence of a tender -side to the Anglo-Saxon nature. Such are : 
Deorswithe, Very Dear ; Deorwyne, Darling Joy ; Edflida, Stream of 
Happiness ; Elfgif u, Gift of the Elves ; Bertha, Bright ; and many other 
similar ones.* 

Certainly such names, before they became conventional, were more 
picturesque than are our modern meaningless designations, which, in 
many instances, are scarcely more suggestive or euphonious than, for 
example, No. 3 or No. 11 would be. 

Among the Anglo-Saxons, the male child ceased, technically, at the 
age of eight years to be an infant and became a youth. Allowing for 
difference in time and environment, I dare say they were pretty much 
such boys as other boys have been and are ; and our discussion of them 
might perhaps best begin and end with simply saying that they were 
boys. As is well known, boys constitute a genus by themselves, sub- 
divided into two species : good boys — some would have it that this 
species exists only on paper — and bad boys. Anglo-Saxon boys, of 
course, afforded no exception to this classification. 

We know, from his own evidence, that the Venerable Bede was 
* Examples mainly from Thrupp's Anglo-Saxon Home. 



CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 233 

once one of the boys ; for he tells ns that, till his eighth } T ear, he gave 
his mind alone to such plays and enjoyments as boys delighted in, 
taking great pleasure in mirth and clamor. He speaks in no very 
diffident way of his achievements among the other youths, claiming 
that lie could at least hold his own with the best or the worst of them. 
He tells us that the Anglo-Saxons trained their children from their 
earliest years in running, wrestling, jumping, and other athletic exer- 
cises. Fighting and hunting came as additional accomplishments as 
they grew older. 

When the Anglo-Saxon child became a youth, he was called a 
cniht (German, Knecht), that is, servant. This is the word that after- 
ward passed into the form and meaning of knight. They seem to have 
been trained to habits of obedience, and to have served visitors under 
the parental roof. 

In the earliest times, the Anglo-Saxon youth, with all their woes, 
at least never had to submit to the bondage of the schoolmaster ; but 
with the introduction of Christianity, and the consequent great im- 
provement in their condition, came, as an offset, the school with its 
attendant labors and restraints. At first, the only teachers were the 
priests, and the meagre instruction imparted was confined almost 
entirely to such as proposed to take holy orders. Alfred had to force 
his officials to learn to read and write ; and if anything prevented one 
of them from doing so, he had to send a son or a slave to learn in his 
stead, much to the substitute's sorrow, perhaps. 

But as time passed, the courses of study improved very much, and 
education became more general. Bede (IV. 2) informs us that in the 
school established by Bishop Theodore, instruction was given under 
the heads of poetry, astrononrv, and arithmetic. In the school at 
York, where Alcuin was a pupil, grammar, rhetoric, astronomy, 
poetry, natural philosophy, metaphysics, medicine, and theology 
were taught. 

Great progress in education was made in these early times ; but 
the Norsemen brought confusion and devastation, and the ruin of the 
schools. Alfred found his people relapsed into dense ignorance. The 
members of the royal family were no exception. We learn from the 
biography of Alfred, ascribed to Asser, that Alfred's brothers could 
neither read nor write, and that their instruction was limited to the 
singing of psalms and reciting of poetry. The biographer says that 
Alfred himself, " through the wicked neglect of his parents and nurses, 
at the age of twelve had not yet learned to read." He then goes on 
to tell the well-known story — how his mother (or step-mother, Judith '.) 
once displayed to Alfred and his brothers a beautifully illuminated 
book of Anglo-Saxon poetry, and offered it to the one of them who 



234 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

should first be able to recite its contents. Alfred, the youngest, whether 
attracted by the beauty of the book or of the poetry, undertook the 
task, and by having it often read to him won the prize. This is said 
to have given him his first impulse towards learning to read. 

Alfred, in the course of his strenuous efforts to improve the condi- 
tion of his people in the matter of education, is said to have brought 
over to England youths from foreign lands, who were accustomed to 
study, " to serve as decoy ducks, 1 ' in order that the reluctant and 
perhaps somewhat thick-headed Anglo-Saxon boys might be stimu- 
lated to study, and might see how it was done. In the wars and 
bloodshed that followed his reign, a great part of the good work done 
by him for education was again swept away, but some of the effects 
remained along with its traditions. 

The Anglo-Saxon youth were never spoilt, if we may trust their 
own evidence, through the sparing of the rod. They speak repeatedly 
of the great virtue that lay in this instrument : it was " the quickener 
of intelligence," " the strengthener of memory," the general panacea, 
it would seem, for all youthful failings. Their writers refer regularly 
to their schooldays as the period when they were " under the rod." 
Alcuin expresses his gratitude to the good brethren of York Minster, 
for their care of him, as follows : " Ye cherished the weak mind of my 
infancy with maternal affection ; ye sustained my wanton days of 
childhood with pious patience ; ye brought me to the perfect age of 
manhood by the discipline of paternal castigation." And again, in 
illustrating some point, he says : " As scourges teach children to learn 
the ornament of wisdom, and to accustom themselves to good man- 
ners," etc. 

The rod, proper, was reserved for sturdy youth. Infants, who 
were not yet strong enough to endure it, had the soles of their feet 
pricked with an instrument, the acra, made for the purpose. It was 
considered very stimulating. 

There is extant a dialogue,* in which an Anglo-Saxon pupil in 
training for holy orders applies to a master for instruction in Latin. 
The master at once inquires how he wishes to be taught, whether by 
scourging, or not. This shows that the rod was regarded not simply as 
a means of accentuating a reproof, but as a method of enlarging the 
intelligence. To such unsuspected agencies do we owe, in some part, 
it would seem, the sturdy physique and splendid intellect of the 
descendants of these much-belabored ancestors. 

The youth in the above-mentioned dialogue makes a reply which 
I, in the light of personal experience as schoolboy and with school- 
boys, must consider as casting some discredit upon the story. He 
* Wright, Colloq. Arch. Alfr. 



CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 235 

replies that he much prefers being thrashed to not learning. But it 
must be taken into consideration that this sort of discipline is no nov- 
elty to him, for he says further on that he has been accustomed to 
being awakened in the morning, sometimes by the church bell, some- 
times by his master's rod. 

The drubbing seems to have been laid on with anything that was 
handy. It is said that King Ethelred, while yet a child, once angered 
his mother, and she, not having a rod convenient, used some heavy 
candles as a substitute, and with such effect that Ethelred could never 
afterwards endure the sight of a candle.* 

It was believed, too, that a beating, well administered, would not 
only stimulate the intellect, but would impress upon the memory any 
circumstance with which it was associated ; and it was often inflicted 
with this purpose. To illustrate : the children were flogged at Chil- 
dermass, with a view to impressing upon their memory 'the massacre 
of the innocents by King Herod. Certainly, in this case, cruelty to 
innocents was illustrated by example, the difference between the thing 
to be illustrated and the illustration being only in decree. 

But the much-drubbed schoolboy, like the worm, may turn ; and 
we have the evidence of William of Malmesbury and others that the 
pupils of the school at Malmesbury once fell upon an especially cruel 
master and killed him with their pens. There arose, however, in 
time, teachers who believed in other methods; and we read with 
pleasure of an Abbot of Croyland, Turketel, who rewarded the more 
industrious pupils with figs, raisins, apples, pears, and the like. The 
good Abbot should be canonized by the boys as their patron saint. 

Before the introduction of the so-called Arabic notation and sys- 
tem in calculation, the Anglo-Saxon youth labored under great diffi- 
culties in his study of arithmetic. Aldhelm says that the labor of 
mastering all his other studies was small as compared with that 
expended on his arithmetic. Following the ancients, they talked of 
numbers as equally equal, equally unequal, unequally equal, even and 
odd, simple, composite, and mean ; as superfluous, defective, and per- 
fect ; and there was much more useless machinery of a like kind. The 
problems in arithmetic were often quaint and fantastic. The follow- 
ing is one of several cited by Thrupp : « The swallow once invited the 
snail to dinner ; he lived just one league from the spot, and the snail 
travelled at the rate of one inch a day. How long would it be before 
he dined ? " 

Their natural philosophy, while in the main erroneous, was, never- 
theless, a good training, in that it caused the youth to look to nature 
for the causes of natural occurrences. They thought and taught, for 
* Thrupp, Anglo-Saxon Home. 



2 3 6 ESS A YS— MIXED. 

instance, that thunder and lightning resulted from the collision of the 
clouds, and that earthquakes were caused by winds rushing through 
caverns in the earth. 

The astronomy learned by the pupils in these Anglo-Saxon schools 
was sufficient to puzzle wiser heads than it is likely that they carried. 
Alfric, quoting Alcuin, tells us that the heavens were of the nature of 
fire, and always turning the stars from east to west ; and that the 
motion was so rapid that disaster would result, were it not for the 
restraining influence of the seven planets, which moved in an opposite 
direction, and so diminished the rapid movement of the heavens. 
These crude ideas were taken from Latin works ; but the Anglo-Saxon 
teachers seem not to have known the best work of the Alexandrine 
Greeks. 

Of geography, and of men and manners in other countries, their 
ideas were equally vague. Sharon Turner quotes from an Anglo- 
Saxon manuscript in the Cotonian Library the statement, that on the 
way to the Red Sea there was a place that contained red hens, and if 
a man touched them he would be at once burned to ashes. The 
necessary inference seems to be that some ingenious owner of fowls 
had been imposing upon the credulity of Anglo-Saxon travellers, who 
even then displayed huge appetites and vague consciences in matters 
of annexation. The same manuscript tells of men with boar's tusks, 
dog's heads, and horse's manes, who breathed flames ; of ants as big 
as dogs, which dug gold, and gave it to men in exchange for young 
camels, which they devoured — evidently an echo from old Herodotus. 
There were men in Gaul or France, it said further, with heads like 
those of lions, and mouths like the sails of windmills. They were 
twenty feet high, but would readily run away. So we see that the 
detractions of perfidious Albion are not new. 

An extract from a dialogue * between Alcuin and his pupil, Pepin, 
son of Charlemagne, will illustrate much of the so-called instruction of 
the Anglo-Saxon youth ; for Alcuin had brought his methods with 
him from England. It will be seen that, while passing as a lesson in 
useful knowledge, it is really a more or less picturesque word-play 
and exercise in constructing fantastic metaphors, conundrums, and 
epigrams. The pupil questions, and Alcuin answers : 

" What is a letter ? The keeper of history. 

" What is a word ? The betrayer of the mind. 

" What is the tongue \ The scourge of the air. 

" What is man \ The slave of death ; a transient traveller ; a local 
guest. 

" How is man placed ? As a lamp in the wind. 

* Sharon Turner, History of the A nglo- Saxons, III. 262. 



CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS. 237 

" What is sleep \ The image of death. 

" What is man's liberty ? Innocence. 

" What is the head ? The crown of the body. 

" What is the body ? The home of the mind. 

"What are the eyes? The leaders of the body; the vessels of 
light ; the index of the mind. 

"What is the sun? The splendor of the world; the beauty of 
heaven; the grace of nature; the honor of day; the distributer of 
the hours. 

"What is the moon? The eye of the night; the giver of dew ; 
the prophet of the weather. 

"What is the earth? The mother of the growing; the nurse of 
the living ; the storehouse of life ; the devourer of all things. 

"What is the sea? The path of audacity; the fountain of 
showers ; the refuge of danger ; the favorer of pleasures." Here the 
spirit of the sea-rover speaks. 

" What is fire % Excess of heat,"— concise, if not scientific. 

" What is snow ? Dry water. 

" What is spring ? The painter of the earth. 

" What is autumn ? The granary of the year. 

" What makes a man never weary ? Gain. 

" What is that which is and is not ? Nothing." 

This somewhat long quotation contains much that scarcely deserves 
a better name than trifling, though, in places, the figures themselves 
are poetic. Indeed, we find here much the same kind of profuse 
imagery that abounds in the poetry of the Anglo-Saxons. Perhaps, 
after all, this exercise was intended simply as a rhetorical drill. 

It would be unfair to leave undisputed the natural inference from 
the above and what will follow, that Alcuin was only a wordy pedant. 
He was one of the greatest scholars of his time,* and as such was 
selected by Charlemagne as instructor for himself and his children, 
and as general organizer of educational institutions in his realm. 

I shall close with a passage from a letter from this same Alcuin 
to Charlemagne, which, in spite of its excessively florid style— and it 
would be difficult to find its equal in this respect— will serve to show 
that the facilities for higher education offered at this time to Anglo- 
Saxon youth were in advance of those to be found on the continent. 
The library at York referred to was not long afterwards utterly 
destroyed by the ruthless Norsemen. 

Alcuin, while superintending the studies in the schools which he 
had established at Tours, found himself sadly in need of books suitable 
for advanced work. In the letter mentioned above he says : " Accord- 
ing to your exhortations and kind wish, I endeavor to administer, in 



238 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

the schools of St. Martin, to some, the honey of the sacred writings ; 
I try to inebriate others with the wine of the ancient classics ; I begin 
to nourish some with the apples of grammatical subtlety ; I strive to 
illuminate many by the arrangement of the stars, as from the painted 
roof of a lofty palace. But I want those more exquisite books of schol- 
arly erudition which I had in my own country. May it, then, please 
your wisdom that I send some of our youths to procure what we need, 
and to convey into France the flowers of Britain, that they may not 
be locked up in York only, but that their fragrance and fruit may 
adorn at Tours the gardens and streams of the Loire." * 

* Sharon Turner : History of the Anglo-Saxons, III. 12. 



THE EARLY LITERATURE OF SPAIN. 

BY J. D. B. DE BOW. 

[James Dun woody Brownson de Bow was born in Charleston, S. C, July 10, 1820. 
In 1843 he was graduated from Charleston College, and was later admitted to the bar of 
that city. He was, for a while, editor of the Southern Quarterly Review. In 1845 he 
removed to New Orleans, where he established and edited De Bow's Revieiv. In 1848 he 
was elected Professor of Political Economy in the University of Louisiana. In 1850-53 
he had charge of the Census Bureau of the State, and during part of Pierce's administra- 
tion he held the office of Superintendent of the Census of the United States. He was 
the author of The Southern States : their Agriculture, Commerce, etc. (1856). His best 
edited work is on Mortality Statistics. He died in Elizabeth, N. J., February 27, 1867.] 

The Moorish power in Spain was marked by much that was glori- 
ous in civilization, in luxury and letters ; and, amid the darkness and 
gloom which had settled upon Europe, shone forth with steady and 
almost dazzling brightness. Men of letters congregated there from 
all the world, attracted by its libraries, its schools, and its scholars ; 
and many of the regenerating influences which, long afterward, dissi- 
pated the night of the middle ages, may be traced to the intellectual 
empires of Cordova and Granada. 

The Gothicized Latin of the Christians, coming now in intimate 
association with the Arabic, a more polished and refined one, adopted 
many of its forms, and borrowed copiously from its vocabulary. The 
change was gradual and continuous, and, about the middle of the 
twelfth century, the amalgamated elements had risen to the dignitv of 
a written language, known, ever since, as the Castilian, or Spanish. 
From this period is traced the history of Spanish literature. 

Here we recognize, according to Mr. Ticknor, the existence, in 
Spain, of a language, spreading gradually throughout the greater part 
of the country, different from the pure or the corrupted Latin, and 
still more different from the Arabic, yet obviously formed by a union 
of both, modified by the analogies and spirit of the Gothic construc- 
tions and dialects, and containing some remains of the vocabularies of 
the Spanish tribes, of the Iberians, the Celts, and the Phoenicians, who, 
at different periods, had occupied nearly or quite' the whole of the 
peninsula. This language was called, originally, the Romance, because 
it was so much formed out of the language of the Romans ; later it 
was called Spanish, and at last, more frequently, called Castilian, from 
that portion of the country whose political power grew to be so pre- 
dominant as to give its dialect a preponderance over all others. The 



240 ESSA TS— MIXED. 

proportion of all these elements is estimated, by Sarmiento : six-tenths 
of Latin origin, one-tenth Greek and ecclesiastical, one-tenth Northern, 
one-tenth Arabic, one-tenth East Indian, American, gypsy, modern 
German, French, and Italian. 

The first known author in the Castilian was one Gonzalo, a priest, 
who lived about 1240, and wrote an octavo volume of poems, mostly 
of the religious order. The following, from his "Mourning of the 
Virgin at the Cross," is very life-like : 

" My son, in me and thee life still was felt as one ; 
I loved thee much, and thou lovedst me in perfectness, my son ; 
My faith in thee was sure, and I thy faith had won, 
And doth thy large aud pitying fate forget me now, my son ? 
My son, forget me not, but take my soul with thine — 
The earth holds but one heart that kindred is with mine, 
John, whom thou gav'st to be my child, who here witli me doth pine: 
I pray thee, then, that to my prayer thou graciously incline." 

Previously to this, however, there are many anonymous poems, the 
most celebrated of which is that of the Cid, consisting of about three 
thousand lines. The Cid was a popular hero of the chivalrous age of 
Spain ; and the poem narrates, with stirring, graphic, yet rude power, 
the long series of glorious exploits that marked his eventful and splen- 
did military career. It is, besides, a faithful and simple picture of the 
manners, customs, and institutions of that romantic period. 

The next known author in Castilian literature is Alfonso the Tenth, 
or, as he is distinguished in history, " Alfonso the wise." A poet and 
a philosopher, it was said of him, " He was more fit for letters than for 
the government of his subjects ; he studied the heavens and watched 
the stars, but forgot the earth and lost his kingdom." To this mon- 
arch the world is indebted for that code which has had so wide an 
influence for its wisdom and equity, and which, at this day, constitutes 
almost the common law of Spain — the Partidas. This valuable work 
was undertaken in 1263 or 1265, and called Las Siete Partidas, or the 
" seven parts," from the number of divisions it contained. It is dis- 
tinguished in general for a peaceful and polished style, working upon 
the materials of the Decretals, the Digest and Code of Justinian, the 
Fuero Juzgo, a collection of Visigoth laws made by St. Ferdinand, 
the father of Alfonso, and other Spanish and foreign authorities. The 
Partidas, however, differs very much in nature and character from the 
Justinian and Napoleon codes, and is rather a collection of legal, moral, 
and religious treatises, systematically arranged. It abounds in dis- 
cussions of various kinds, and presents, according to Mr. Ticknor, a 
digested result of the readings of a learned monarch and his coadjutors 
in the thirteenth century, on the relative duty of a king and his sub- 



THE EARLY LITERATURE OF SPAIN. 241 

jects, and on the entire legislation and police, ecclesiastical, civil, and 
moral, to which, in their opinion, Spain should be subjected ; the whole 
interspersed with discussions, sometimes more quaint than grave, etc., 
etc. 

This code, though it was not for nearly a century recognized as of 
binding authority in Spain, has ever afterward maintained the high- 
est rank in that country and her colonies, and, since the annexation of 
Louisiana and Florida to the United States, has been consulted con- 
stantly and applied by our jurists. 

Among the earliest monuments of Spanish literature, the " Ballads " 
occupy a distinguished place. The first lispings of the muse seem to 
have taken this form, for which it is not difficult to account, consider- 
ing the extraordinary character of the times. Those which have been 
preserved to us in the various collections, and which, no doubt, suf- 
fered mutilation in their long traditionary passage, are very numerous, 
breathe a spirit of genuine poetic fervor, religion, patriotism, and chiv- 
alry, and, being the product of a people more advanced in civilization 
and refinement, are considered greatly superior in literary excellence 
to the early Scotch and English ballads. They are purely Castilian, 
and expressive of the national sympathies and spirit in so high and 
perfect a degree as to be sung by the muleteers of Spain of the 
present day precisely as they were heard by Don Quixote in his ad- 
ventures to Toboso. Love, war, religion, chivalry, and heroism are 
their subjects ; and, partaking of the spirit of those glorious struggles 
for God, liberty, and nationality, which for so many hundred years 
were displayed by the Christians of Spain, they burn with all the fires 
of a lofty and genuine inspiration. The authors and dates of most of 
these are unknown, and the collection, as embraced in the Rornaneeros 
Generates, consists of above a thousand poems. 

We conclude, however, unwillingly, with the simple and touchingly 
beautiful ballad, where an elder sister reproaches the younger, on 
noticing her first symptoms of love. It would seem that the tender 
inspiration differed little five hundred years ago and now, and its 
unmistakable signs are as recognizable in our day, in Laura, Mary, 
Sally, or Betsy, as in simple " little Jane " in the ballad : 

Her sister, Miguella, 

Once chid little Jane, 
And the words that she spoke 

Gave a great deal of pain : 

" You went yesterday playing, 

A child, like the rest; 
And now you come out, 

More than other girls, dressed. 

16 



242 ESSA VS— MIXED. 

" You take pleasure in sighs, 
In sad music delight; 

With the dawning you rise, 
Yet sit up half the night. 

" When you take up your work, 
You look vacant and stare, 

And gaze on your sampler, 
But miss the stitch there. 

" You're in love, people say — 
Your actions all show it ; 

New ways we shall have 
When mother shall know it. 

" She'll nail up the windows, 
And lock up the door ; 

Leave to frolic and dance 
She will give us no more. 

" Old aunt will be sent 
To take us to mass, 

And stop all our talk 

With the girls as we pass. 

" And when we walk out, 
She will bid our old shrew 

Keep a faithful account 
Of what our eyes do; 

" And mark who goes by, 
If I peep through the blind, 

Aud be sure to detect us 
In looking behind. 

" Thus for your idle follies 
Must I suffer too, 

And though nothing I've done, 
Be punished like you ! " 

" O sister Miguella, 
Your chiding pray spare ; 

That I've troubles, you guess 
But not what they are. 

" Young Pedro it is, 
Old Juan's fair youth ; 

But he's gone to the wars, 
And where is his truth ? 

" I loved him sincerely, 
I loved all he said ; 

But I fear he is fickle, 
I fear he is fled ! 



THE EARLY LITERATURE OF SPAIN. 243 

" He is gone of free choice, 

Without summons or call, 
And 'tis foolish to love him 

Or like him at all." 

" Nay, rather do thou 

To God pray above, 
Lest Pedro return, 

And again you should love," 

Said Miguella, in jest, 

As she answered poor Jane ; 
" For when love has been bought 

At cost of such pain, 

" What hope is there, sister, 

Unless the soul part, 
That the passion you cherish 

Should yield up your heart ? 

" Your years will increase, 

But so will your pains, 
And this you may learn 

From the proverb's old strains : 

" ' If when but a child 

Love's power you own, 
Pray what will you do 

When you older are grown ? ' " 



PETRARCH AND LAURA. 



BY RICHARD HENRY WILDE. 



[Richard Henry Wilde was born in Dublin, Ireland, September 24, 1789. Dur- 
ing his childhood his parents brought him and their other children to Baltimore, Md. 
After the death of his father, he removed with his mother to Augusta, Ga., where he 
studied law. He was barely of age when elected Attorney-General of Georgia, and sub- 
sequently served, with distinction, for several terms in Congress. In 1834 he went to 
Europe, where he remained until 1840, devoting himself specially to the study of the 
various European literatures. Removing to New Orleans in 1843, he was, on the organ- 
ization of the Law Department of the University of Louisiana, selected to fill the chair of 
Constitutional Law. His famous poem, Lament of the Captive — more popularly known 
through its opening line, "My life is like a summer rose" — gave rise, through a 
learned friend's mischief, to one of those acrid controversies which rage around dis- 
puted authorship. In 1842 he published a work in two volumes, on the Love, Madness, 
and Imprisonment of Torquato Tasso, which, while including choice translations from 
the Italian poet's Canzones, threw a new light upon one of the vexed questions of ama- 
tory inspirations of poets. He also contributed to the Southern Review a famous essay 
on Petrarch and Laura, which questions the claims of the latter to her immortal asso- 
ciation. He died in New Orleans, September 10, 1847.] 

Of all the women who have been deified by their poetic adorers, 
Laura seems to us one of the least interesting. Why, then, did 
Petrarch love her ? If we consult our own experience and observa- 
tion, we shall not ask that question, nor its converse — Why did she 
not love him ? Love is commonly the result of accident or caprice, 
rarely of any intellectual merit. The hope to win it by celebrity, 
though frequently indulged, is among the vainest of illusions, and 
Laura may have smiled at such a folly without being unusually stupid 
or insensible. The greater part of her sex, like the greater part of 
ours, have no just conception or ardent love of glor} T . In general, 
they hold immortality as cheap as the mother of mankind or the 
widow of Napoleon. 

There have been remarkable and splendid examples to the contrary, 
it is true ; but fortunately or unfortunately for us, and for themselves, 
the mass remains unchanged. Many have indeed been inseparably 
associated with undying names, often undeservedly, sometimes in their 
own despite ; but most, being of the earth, earthy, would have lost 
that privilege, had not the weakness of vanity or tenderness preserved 
the memorials of their triumph, and thus rescued them from merited 
oblivion. Nina, who would be called nothing but the Nina of Dante, 
is the exception, not the rule. Even she, perhaps, was thought very 



PETRARCH AND LAURA. 245 

naughty in her lifetime, and if she sacrificed temporary good repute 
to long ages of celebrity, had nearly made the sacrifice in vain, since, 
though a poetess herself, she was so little of a critic as to choose 
Dante da Maiano, an indifferent versifier. Far be it from us to 
malign the fairer part of creation, to whom every rhymer is a born 
bondsman ; but, in truth and prose, the condition of woman excludes 
her for the most part from these lofty aspirations. Shut up within 
the narrow circle of petty vanities, household cares, frivolous amuse- 
ments, devotional exercises, and trivial occupations, she rarely feels 
inclined to look beyond it, and if she does, is visited with the anger of 
all her sisterhood. There is little reason to believe that Laura burst 
the spell, or was in any wise exempted from the common destiny, ex- 
cept by the fortune of a more illustrious lover. Her long-continued 
system of alternate encouragement and repulse, so delicately managed 
and adroitly blended, as always to keep alive his hopes, yet always 
disappoint them, may not deserve to be stigmatized as the refinement 
of heartless coquetry, but certainly excludes the idea of warm and 
sincere attachment. The very ascendency she acquired over him, by 
her constant self-possession and invariable cabnness, indicates the 
action of a more phlegmatic, on a more impassioned nature. For the 
rest, discretion, sweetness, good sense, religious faith, and serenity 
make up the sum of an amiable and tranquil disposition, as feminine 
as you please, and as remote as possible from all our early romantic 
conceptions. . . . 

Could the veil of ages be withdrawn, she might be found either 
frail or cold, and, whichever the alternative, must lose a portion of 
her worshippers. Now, on the contrary, those who are not satisfied 
with either part of this dilemma have still open to their faith the 
further supposition, that Laura, tenderly loving Petrarch, concealed 
or governed her affection for one-and-twenty years, never driving him 
to despair by her rigor, nor betraying the secret of her weakness. 
But Avhether she was enamored and virtuous, or only coquettish, pru- 
dent, or indifferent, it must not be inferred she took no pleasure in her 
lover's praises. Who is offended by a delicate and well-turned compli- 
ment ? — or what woman, however insensible to the beauties of poetry, 
ever failed to admire a sonnet to her own eyebrow? Love is not 
kindled by rhyme, but self-love is fed by it ; nor should we without 
reflection condemn Laura for not valuing more highly, or making a 
more grateful return for the offering. We behold in Petrarch the 
restorer of learning, the creator of a new poetry, the beautifier of a 
language which is all melody. She saw in him only a persevering- 
sonneteer, who annoyed her with complaints, or soothed her by flat- 
tery. To us he appears with the glory of five centuries. Could he 



246 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

have laid it all at her feet, possibly she might have yielded. With the 
confidence of genius he often promised her immortality. But how 
could she believe him ? Did he always believe himself ? So far from 
it, he at one time set little value on his love verses, building his hopes 
of fame upon his Latin poems. 

The lady whose apotheosis has been made by the love and poetry 
of Petrarch, there is every reason to believe, was anything but happy. 
His devotion, which alone has embalmed her memory, we may readily 
suppose, brought upon her both envy and censure. The propriety of 
her conduct is said, indeed, to have been such as to defy the gossips 
of Avignon. The offence of being beautiful and idolized, however, 
is rarely expiated even by an abandonment of the heart's affections. 
Our contemporaries ever judge us harshly. The living rarely get 
credit for their real worth. Nay, they are often hated for the very 
virtues by which they eclipse others, while in the eyes of posterity 
every fault and almost every crime is absolved by greatness. Laura, 
we may believe, if she really loved Petrarch, sacrificed her attachment 
to duty or to reputation, though she was unable or unwilling to forego 
the incense offered to her charms. The sacrifice was in vain, save to 
her own conscience, for Ugo, her husband, was harsh and jealous, and 
so little attached to her memory that he married shortly after her 
death ; while her daughter, Ogiera, so far forgot the maternal exam- 
ple, even in her mother's lifetime, that the honor of the family obliged 
them to shut her up in a convent. Thus the celebrity of Laura arises 
from a homage which it was Aveakness, perhaps worse, to allow, while 
her virtues were inadequate to insure her domestic happiness, and 
most certainly alone would never have preserved her from oblivion. 
So strange are the caprices of fame and fortune, so uncertain and 
inconsequent the judgments of mankind. 



MACBETH.* 

BY WILLIAM PRESTON JOHNSTON. 

[ William Preston Johnston, son of General Albert Sidney Johnston, was born in 
Louisville, Ky., January 5, 1831. In 1852 he was graduated from Yale College, and 
later received his diploma from the Law School of the University of Louisville. In that 
city he practised law until the beginning of the Civil War, when he entered the Confed- 
erate Army as Major of the First Kentucky Regiment of Infantry. He was soon pro- 
moted to the Lieutenant-Colonelcy of that regiment, and latterly served as aide-de-camp 
on the staff of Jefferson Davis. After the war, he practised law for one year in Louis- 
ville ; then he was called to the chair of History and English Literature in Washington 
College, Lexington, Ya. In 1880 he accepted the presidency of the Louisiana State 
University, and in January, 1883, when the University of Louisiana was reorganized as 
the Tulane University, he was elected president of the institution. This position he still 
holds. He is a litterateur and poet of considerable ability. His Life of Albert Sidney 
Johnston (1878) deserves as high a place in American literature as Parton's Life of 
Andrew Jackson or Colton's Life of Henry Clay. It is written in a style remarkable 
for its transparency, its earnestness, its elegance ; and most critics agree that it is the 
most " satisfactory" biography of a general of the ex-Confederacy that has yet appeared. 
Colonel Johnston's Prototype of Hamlet, and Other Shakespearian Problems (1890) places 
him among the first Shakespearian scholars of the times. Commenting upon the work, 
Professor Lounsbury of Yale says : " I was glad to find Colonel Johnston entertaining the 
same feeling about Macbeth that I do. ... I was much struck by his argument in 
regard to the first Hamlet. To me it seems the strongest presentation of the evidence 
in favor of the Shakespearian authorship of that production with which I am familiar."] 

Whether Macbeth is the greatest of Shakespeare's plays or not, I 
think there can be no doubt that it is his greatest poem. This is the 
more remarkable as it is probable from internal evidences that it never 
received the finishing touches so necessary for the perfection of a 
work of art, but stands like some colossal statue — the dream of a seer 
— the stupendous outline of a great soul-study, conceived in its entirety 
in the mind of the artist. We discover gaps in the plot, confusion in 
the metaphor, details half completed, and a lack of those final thoughts 
which, like sweetest roses before a killing frost, blossomed forth in 
his last version of Hamlet. But this very incompleteness compels us, 
as it were, to enter the charmed circle of the poet's imaginings, view 
the author's mind in the processes of creation, and share with him in 
the solemn mystery of the production of this grand drama. 

It may be, as Swinburne suggests, " that the sole text we possess 
of Macbeth has not been interpolated, but mutilated." He describes it 

* [ The Prototype of Hamlet, and Other Shakespearian Problems (1890).] 



248 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

as " piteously rent and ragged and clipped and garbled in some of its 
earlier scenes ; the rough construction and the poltfoot metre, lame 
sense and limping verse, each maimed and mangled subject of players' 
and printers' most treasonable tyranny contending as it were to seem 
harsher than the other." Yet, along with the wise and deep-seeing 
authors before cited, this most musical of critics tells us, " But if 
Othello be the most pathetic, King Lear the most terrible, Hamlet the 
subtlest and deepest, work of Shakespeare, the highest in abrupt and 
steep simplicity of epic tragedy is Macbeth? 

In the spirit of this suggestion I am prepared to admit that Macbeth 
may be (for I dread dogmatism) rather the torso of some masterpiece 
of our dramatic Phidias than the uncompleted ideal of his tragic muse. 
But, dropping metaphor, the greatness of the events, the rapidity of 
the action, the compression of the thought, the fervor of the diction, 
and the simplicity and directness of the moral movement render it 
a noble example of tragic art. Macbeth is not only, as Hallam called 
it, the great epic drama, but also the great heroic drama. The action 
is shrouded in mysterious gloom, or lurid with an unholy supernatural 
light ; the persons of the drama move in shadow, vast, sombre, and 
majestic, like beings of some older and larger creation. As in the 
Iliad, Achilles, Ulysses, and Agamemnon deal with the Immortals, 
give the sword-thrust or receive the wound, so when Banquo and 
stout Macduff, the saintly Duncan and bloody Macbeth, enter the 
field of vision, the meaner race of mortals vanishes from sight. Hence 
the artistic effects of this play are not produced by nice gradations 
of shade, but by strong contrasts of color in scene, incidents, circum- 
stance, and character. The elements are in tumult ; and the landscape, 
black beneath the lowering storm-cloud, is, nevertheless, belted with 
peaceful bands of sunshine. Fell murder and dire cruelty work out 
their purposes on innocence and loyalty, and final retribution is met 
" dareful, beard to beard," by defiant remorse. Macbeth is, indeed, a 
tremendous epic in dramatic form — an epic in the rush and swirl of 
its objective action, but a very paean of subjective evolution struck from 
the fervid lyre of a heart white hot. But implicit within the folds of 
its royal drapery of poetry, indeed, at the very heart of its ancient 
legend, couches one of the problems of destiny — a mystery of the 
human soul — which we would do well to pluck forth and lay bare to 
the scrutiny of our intelligence. 

I have not selected this tragedy because its problem is the most 
difficult to solve, for, on the contrary, it is the most obvious ; but it is 
one of the grandest and most pathetic. It is the old story of tempta- 
tion, crime, and retributive justice. Hamlet and Macbeth were finished 
almost about the same time; Ha mid, as an idea which had grown 



MACBETH. 249 

through a series of years and been worked out to its consummation ; 
and Macbeth, probably suggested by it, hurled from the crater of the 
author's imagination into the empyrean. Together they constitute 
the obverse and reverse of the heaven-stamped medal we call the 
human will. They are psychological complements of each other. In 
Hamlet the renunciation of the human will is balanced by the despot- 
ism of will in Macbeth. In Hamlet, " the courtier, soldier, scholar, 
the expectancy and rose of the fair state," is " quite, quite down " — 
and why ? Because a morbid conscience and irresolute heart keep his 
subtle intellect in pla} T , until the moment for action has passed, and 
his vacillation overwhelms with ruin all his house. But the Thane of 
Glamis, audacious, merciless, and prompt, closes with his opportunity, 
and on the instant puts his soul past surgery. All must bend or break 
before the energy of his tremendous will and his lawless lust of domin- 
ion. But Nemesis follows him too, and his crime works out its 
inevitable penalty. 

But let us come now to the play itself, and consider the material 
and web of the plot, and how its moral purpose is evolved. A medi- 
aeval legend from Holinshed's dry Chronicle furnishes the incidents of 
the story. Following this outline, but weaving into it striking fea- 
tures from other similar tales, the author wins the credence of his 
audience by an apparent adherence to historical fact ; while his perfect 
dramatic instinct teaches him to produce the profoundest impressions 
by conforming these rigid materials to the standard of ideal, universal, 
essential truth. Here is the story of Macbeth : Duncan, the saintly 
but feeble King of Scotland, is assailed by rebellion and invasion, 
which are repelled by his two generals, Macbeth and Banquo, who 
win public commendation and the rewards of the King. While return- 
ing from victory, they meet upon a blasted heath the three Weird 
Sisters, who hail Macbeth as Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and 
King of Scotland hereafter, and predict for Banquo that his offspring- 
shall ascend the throne. Banquo's sturdy honesty rejects the bait, 
but Macbeth's restless ambition hovers around the unholy prediction. 
The messengers of the King meet him, and announce that the King- 
has given him the titles and estates of the rebellious and vanquished 
Thane of Cawdor. Already, by inheritance, he was Thane of Glamis. 

" Two truths are told, 
As happy prologues to the swelling act 
Of the imperial theme." 

A fiendish suggestion has planted in his breast a wicked thought. 
He entertains it there, and it gathers and grows into a purpose to ful- 
fil the prophecy. While this is taking shape, a fatal hint infuses the 



250 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

poison of lawless ambition into the veins of his wife, and the " dear 
partner of his greatness " becomes the partner of his guilt. When he 
hesitates, she urges him to the execution of the crime, through which 
he will ascend the throne. He avails himself of a friendly visit of the 
King to murder him ; and then, to conceal his own guilt, stabs the 
sleeping chamberlains. Duncan's sons, alarmed for their safety, fly. 
Macbeth charges them with the murder, and himself ascends the 
throne. His usurpation now seems established, and all goes well with 
him ; but he cannot feel secure while Banquo lives, for Banquo wit- 
nessed his temptation and may profit by his crime, while his stainless 
integrity stands like a perpetual reproach to Macbeth' s disloyalty and 
guilt. He must die. Banquo is waylaid and assassinated ; but his 
" blood-boltered " ghost rises at a royal banquet to shake the soul of 
Macbeth with horror. In his desperate desire to search out the future, 
the murderous usurper seeks the witches, and, lured by their infernal 
lights, he butchers in cold blood the wife and children of Macduff, 
Thane of Fife, who has fled to the true prince, Malcolm, in England. 
But this cruelty does not prosper. Suspicion, hatred, and horror follow 
him. His wife, pursued by remorse, kills herself. And at last, cheated 
by the fiends he trusted, the tyrant falls in battle by the hand of Mac- 
duff, and the son of the murdered Duncan ascends the throne. From 
these simple materials, the skilful hand and informing spirit of the 
great artist built up a royal palace in the realm of thought. 

The felicity of Shakespeare's genius shows itself in the selection of 
the time and place and plot of this tragedy. Surely these are not 
accidents. The venue is laid in the border-land of fact and fable. 
Macbeth was a contemporary of that Edward the Confessor whose 
reign lingered for generations in the fancy of Saxon England as a 
golden age. It was to Shakespeare a heroic age ; and the figures and 
events of his creation loom up loftily through twilight and mist, too 
large and vague perhaps, did not human passions so sharply define 
them. 

But the place as well as the time of the drama evoke a vivid inter- 
est. Scotland, though neighboring, was yet almost unknown to Eng- 
lishmen of that day, and a series of tragic events and the calamities of 
kings had just linked its history with that of England. James I. had 
but just come to the throne; and, to Southern eyes, Scotland lay like 
a mountain lake, half robed in romance and half veiled in mystery. 
Under the enchanter's wand, this gloomy background faded into a 
land of shadows, the curtain of the unseen world was lifted, and the 
powers of the air mingled with human actors as persons of the drama. 

The staple of the story, too, is not without strong parallelisms to 
events which had recently greatly excited the public mind. Earl 



MACBETH. 251 

Gowrie's conspiracy, aimed at the life of James I., was still fresh in 
the memories of men. The plots known as " the Main " and " the 
Bye," for the murder of the king and the enthronement of his cousin, 
Arabella Stuart, had lately occurred ; and the trials of Sir Walter 
Raleigh and others had awakened the liveliest interest touching regi- 
cide and the breach of a clear title to the crown. If, as best conject- 
ured, this play was completed early in 1600, then it came just on the 
heel of the Gunpowder Plot, which had been fixed for November 5, 
1605 ; and the trials of the wretched fanatics who had compassed the 
destruction of King and Parliament had made the popular mind 
familiar with projects of slaughter and the casuistry of assassination. 
Shakespeare's treatment of his theme commended itself not only to the 
prince, but to the people ; and while he adapted it to the spirit of the 
age, and even to the passing mood of the public, he evinced his trans- 
cendent genius by producing a poem of perennial interest, the spectacle 
of a titanic nature utterly cast down and ruined in its great spiritual 
struggle. Neither in prologue nor in epilogue, nor in the mouth of an y 
interlocutor, does the author announce the moral of the play. Yet he 
who runs may read. It is the contest for the soul of a man. The 
powers of darkness wrestle with and vanquish him. 

We can properly understand this tragedy only by first understand- 
ing its supernaturalism. To do this aright we must look at it from 
the author's standpoint. There is scarcely any subject in literature 
more fascinating than the study of post-mediaeval supernaturalism as 
embodied in the plays of Shakespeare. This is an age and country 
of a skepticism so general and pervading that we find it hard to con- 
ceive of the immense mass of superstition which overlaid the Chris- 
tianity of the Middle Ages. Folklore, the hierarchy of angels and 
demons, the realm of faery, the habits and manners of ghosts ; witch- 
craft with its laws, customs, cultus, and criminal practices ; augu- 
ries, oracles, sorcery, and other manifestations of occult power ; spells, 
talismans, elixirs, and alchemy conjuring with the unknown and unsub- 
dued forces of nature ; astrology and the influence of the stars ; the 
meaning of dreams and visions ; in a word, the whole world of the 
unreal had been systematized into a complete code and body of super- 
natural mythology, believed alike by peasant and prince, by learned 
and unlearned, and by all classes of the community. Relics of this 
remain imbedded in our earlier literature, like flies in amber ; and 
other relics still yet crop out in the fancies, the follies, and the crimes 
of the present generation. This vast machinery of mythology, which 
then represented to the popular mind the secondary causes through 
which God governs his universe, seems to us but the kaleidoscopic 
phases of a disordered dream, a mirage, " an unsubstantial pageant." 



2 5 3 ESS A YS— MIXED. 

But to our ancestors it was as real and solid as the rock-ribbed 
earth. 

In Shakespeare's day, the British people was in the prime of national 
manhood. The light was breaking, and the emancipated human intel- 
lect was waking from the dreams of a thousand years. The prophetic 
soul of Shakespeare accepted the popular beliefs as modes of expres- 
sion, and employed them as symbols for the unseen forces of nature 
and spirit, in which dwell activities more potent than even supersti- 
tion could conjure up. And it was through this high poetic and phil- 
osophic power, this eminent gift of imagination and understanding 
working together, that he produced the terrible and highly idealized 
conception of supernatural agency embodied in the Weird Sisters. 
These and Banquo's ghost, the apparitions, the omens, the air-drawn 
dagger, the mysterious voice, are but the signs and formulas through 
which he represents the problem of evil, with which Macbeth grap- 
ples, and which he solves to his own temporal and eternal ruin. 

A canon of Shakespearian criticism, somewhat fanciful, perhaps, 
has been advanced, that the first scene, or even the first words, of a 
play, will often strike the keynote of the entire action. In Macbeth, 
certainly, they have a curious significance. The enchanter waves his 
wand, and the tragedy begins. Where ? "In a desert place," or 
" open place," as some will have it ; " with thunder and lightning." 
Is it on land or sea, or do the witches " hover through the fog and 
filthy air " % Whether we picture it as a barren heath, or above the 
ferment of the deep, we know that " the secret, black, and midnight 
hags " are gathered on the confines of hell, with the gates ajar. Amid 
the tumult of the elements, and the mutterings of familiar spirits, the 
ominous question is shrieked forth, 

''When shall we three meet again ? " 

This is answered by these " juggling fiends," when they next ap- 
pear as tempters of Macbeth. The fine, lyrical movement of the scene 
reaches its highest pitch in the diabolic suggestion of the chorus : 

" Fair is foul, and foul is fair." 

This phrase symbolizes the reversal of the divine order of nature, 
the love of evil for its own sake, the unforgivable sin. That this is 
not a mere conceit is evinced by the very first words that Macbeth 
utters : 

" So foul and fair a day I have not seen." 

This is the human response to the infernal suggestion, and points 
to the moral confusion which infects the fairest state of man. This 



MACBETH. 



253 



cannot be accidental. It is but one instance among many in Shake- 
speare where the echo of the mysterious footfall of the future is heard 
by an inner sense, and the word of unconscious prophecy is uttered 
!>> this I do not mean those omens and prodigies cited after Duncan's 
death, nor he predictions of the witches, but something subtler, akin 
to the derided and dreaded presentiment of evil 

Attention has been called to Shakespeare's art in opening the play 
with words that are m fact a prelude to its action 

A curious illustration of the ineptitude of much of the comment 
and emendation of Shakespeare will be seen in the following extract 
trom Story s Conversations in a Studio (Vol. 1, p. 94), showing how 
another poet can stumble as to this very opening. 

"Nothing can be more absurd in many respects than Burner's 
translation of Macbeth. Poet though he was, he seems to have lost 
all sense of poetry or reason in this translation, in which, in fact he 
so ludicrously travesties the original, that one cannot but smile at 'the 
absurdities he introduces. The fact is that Burger, who was a very 
vain man, thought himself far superior to Shakespeare, and kindly 
assisted him, and eked out his shortcomings. Think of this openine 
m Macbeth : l ° 

' Soldier. Hold ! not in such a hurrv, good sir. 
Guard. Now, then ? 

Soldier. I prithee, what is it you will tell the kino- ? 
Guard. That the battle is won. 
Soldier. But I have been lying. 

joke^™' L3iUg niSCaU TheU * h ° U art indeGd With thy Wounds a desperate 

" This is a literal translation of one of Burger's improvements to 
Shakespeare. 

An instance of the dramatic second-sight mentioned above is ex- 
death m Can,S comment on the account of Cawdor's repentant 

"There's no art 
To find the mind's construction in the face ; 
He was a gentleman on whom I built 
An absolute trust—" 

Just here the new Thane of Cawdor enters with murder and treason 
m his heart, interrupting the reflection, while the King verifies and 
exemplifies in his words and conduct the aphorism he has just uttered 

Again, where Banquo for the last time leaves the King, he says : 

' "A heavy summons lies like lead upon me, 
And yet I would not sleep." 



254 JESSA YS—3IIXED. 

Here there is something more than meets the ear, for the next 
moment Macbeth, charged with murderous purpose, greets him. In 
Act I., scene 2, Duncan begins, " Wh^t bloody man is this ? " On this 
Bodenstadt comments, " This word ' bloody ' reappears on almost every 
page, and runs like a red thread through the whole piece. In no other 
of Shakespeare's dramas is it so frequent/' Again, Macbeth, while 
plotting Banquo's murder, urges him to attend the banquet. " Fail 
not our feast," he says. Banquo's promise, " My lord, I will not," is 
fulfilled in a sense unexpected by either, or by the reader, when his 
" blood-boltered " ghost rises at the appointed place to shake with 
horror the marble heart of merciless Macbeth. Our secret sins find 
us out. Retribution is the debt never repudiated. The devil keeps 
his appointments. 

The manner in which our poet has portrayed the Weird Sisters is 
but a solitary proof among many how far he was superior in real moral 
insight to the greatest even of the great poets who are sometimes named 
with him. Milton, most learned and religious, most metaphysical and 
most musical of poets, conceives Satan as the archangel ruined, who 
wins our human sympathy by the dazzling sublimity of his super- 
human pride and despair. But Shakespeare's clearer and nobler per- 
ception of the essential ugliness and deformity of sin compels him to 
strike nearer the truth. The Weird Sisters, who embody the idea of 
evil, are beastly and loathsome, as well as terrible. 

The beings called in this tragedy " the Weird Sisters " are not the 
malignant, yet impotent, old witches against whom the royal demon- 
ologist levelled the statute of 1604. Nor are they mere abstractions, 
personifi cations of the wicked promptings of Macbeth's heart. Though 
" bubbles of the air," they are not " fantastical." Real essences, 
prompters of sin, ministers of the evil one, and, like the Scandinavian 
Valkyrias, " posters of the land and sea," they brood over fields of 
slaughter, stir the elements to strife, and derange the moral and 
material order of the world. Such tasks are the work of strong 
fiends ; but, as if in illustration of the essential connection of all evil, 
they do its drudgery with zeal. They mix the hell-broth of foul, 
venomous things, inflict and gloat over pain and misery, and yet are 
full of petty spite and filthiness. They are tempters to sin, and can 
produce human suffering ; but they have no compulsion for the soul, 
and recoil baffled from the assault on innocence. When the Weird 
Sisters struck the chord of unlawful aspiration in the bosom of Mac- 
beth, it swelled into a symphony of treason and murder. But no 
irresistible necessity constrained him. Not fate, but his own free will, 
determined his downward career. And this is shown in that consum- 
mate touch of art by which Banquo is placed by the side of Macbeth 



MACBETH. 255 

and subjected to similar temptations, yet preserves his integrity un- 
sullied, and dies a martyr to his loyalty. The mousing owls of Satan, 
the revolting caricature of humanity in its possible degradation, have 
merely to offer Macbeth the vast suggestion, and its echoes reverberate 
through his hollow and arid heart, until unhallowed re very grows 
into guilty intention, and this ripens into crime. Thomas a'Kempis 
says well : 

"For first a bare thought comes to the mind; then a strong 
imagination ; afterwards delight, and evil motion and consent." So 
was it with Macbeth. He withstood not the beginnings of evil, and 
the end was utter ruin. 

A true conception of the character of Macbeth, in whose soul the 
strife is waged, is necessary to grasp the real purpose of the play. 
This we may learn from the estimate put upon him by the popular 
voice, by his intimates, and by her to whom he had revealed " the 
naked frailties " of his soul. His soliloquies, too, unlock secret cham- 
bers into which the observer looks with sidelong glances. There he 
discerns the difference between this man before and after temptation, 
which, at the last, is the immeasurable distance between innocence 
and guilt, between a soul under probation and a soul betraved and 
lost. J 

When the play opens he was to his followers and peers, " brave 
Macbeth," "valor's minion," "Bellona's bridegroom." The Kino- 
calls him " valiant cousin, 1 ' " worthy gentleman," « noble Macbeth " 
"peerless kinsman." In his own words, he had 

" bought 
Golden opinions from all sorts of people." 

His wife, who thought she knew the man, says of him in her first 
soliloquy : 

"Yet do I fear thy nature. 
It is too full o' the milk of human kindness 
To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great ; 
Art not without ambition, but without 
The illness should attend it; what thou wouldst highly, 
That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false, 
And yet wouldst wrongly win." 

With full allowance for the energy of the speaker's passion and 
ambition, this careful analysis portrays a mixed character. Macbeth's 
own ideal of himself is lofty : 

" I dare do all that may become a man; 
Who dares do more is none." 

The air-drawn dagger and the voice that " cried to all the house," 



256 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

echoes of a conscience startled and aghast, are proofs of an imagina- 
tion both sensitive and magnificent, even were the thoughts not 
uttered in heroic vein. But then, again, this capacious nature is can- 
kered by selfishness. 

There is in Macbeth' s language a very distinct individualization, 
characteristically Shakespearian. His conversation is marked by a 
direct energy and blunt brevity, not uncommon with men of action, 
used to command. Like a true master of fence, reticence is his guard. 
He comes to the point without parley, and keeps at bay his fellow- 
men. But, on the other hand, in self-communion, and in converse 
with that other self, his wife, his imagination lifts itself in widening 
circles, like the eagle's flight, to its pride of place. After the murder, 
he replies to the salutations of the Thanes : 

"Good-morrow, both. 

Macduff. — Is the King stirring, worthy Thane ? 
Macbeth. — Not yet. 

Macduff. — He did command me to call timely on him. 
I have almost slipped the hour. 
Macbeth. — I'll bring you to him. 
Lennox. — Goes the King hence to-day ? 
Macbeth.— He does; he did appoint so." 

And to Lennox's description of the night, he answers : " 'Twas a 
rough night." An examination of the play will show that he main- 
tains this manner of speech throughout. 

It is worth while to note how, in the excitement of preparation for 
his last battle, the tone of Macbeth changes as he addresses one or 
another of the interlocutors. He contemptuously damns the " cream- 
faced loon " who shows fear, and flings a wrathful " Liar and slave " 
at the messenger who brings the bad news of Birnam Wood ; to his 
last friend, his armor-bearer, Seyton, he pours out his heart in sym- 
pathetic and confidential frankness ; and, in the next moment, engages 
the doctor/the man of learning, in an ironical, yet highly imaginative, 
conversation. 

His exalted imagination, his vaulting ambition, and his nearness 
to the throne had lured his thoughts to forbidden fields. Haunted 
by the glories of the royal state, he saw within the circle of the 
diadem power and fame, and (such is human weakness) some vision 
of compensatory beneficence. And this view is countenanced by the 
Chronicle, which describes him as a just, vigorous, and religious mon- 
arch. All this was embraced in his scheme of 

" Solely sovereign sway and masterdom," 



MACBETH. 257 

in the way of which only the feeble Duncan stood. Though Macbeth 
declares the first " supernatural soliciting " of the Weird Sisters a 

'' Suggestion 
Whose horrid image cloth unfix my hair 
And make my seated heart knock at my ribs, 
Against the use of nature," 

yet we find him presently contemplating himself as mounting the 
throne, 

" If chance will have me king, why chance may 
Crown me, without my stir." 

A friend's mischance is to be the airy stepping-stone from thought 
to deed. Macbeth nurses these " black and deep desires." When he 
meets his wife after all his achievements, his first words are, 

" My dearest love, 
Duncan comes here to-night ; " 

and hers, 

" And when goes hence ? " 

to which he significantly replies, 

" To-morrow — as he purposes.' 1 '' 

It is she who shapes the horrid thought in its completeness, 

" Oh, never 
Shall sun that morrow see ! " 

There is a tremendous force of purpose in this short, strong phrase. 
Each word stands out like a boss upon an iron mace. Across this 
sombre hatching of conspiracy, the arrival of the saintly Duncan falls 
like a burst of sunshine. He pauses a moment before the castle gates 
in calm enjoyment of the fair aspect of the peaceful scenery. He says 
to Banquo : 

" This castle hath a pleasant seat ; the air 
Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself 
Unto our gentle senses." 

Banquo, with the same human eye, takes note of 

" This guest of summer, the temple-haunting martlet," 

and briefly draws a picture of tranquil beauty. What an outlook of 
nature smiles upon us ! Then, like the last rays of the setting sun, 

17 



258 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

Duncan's innocence casts its beams upon the portals of that grim 
abode of conspiracy and sudden death. With absolute trust and 
courtly grace he enters the castle. The confiding gentleness with 
which he commits himself to the hands of his assassins is very touch- 
ing. 

But once within the sepulchral jaws of this treasonable den, and 
all is changed. Murder lurks in the murky air. No supernatural 
machinery is needed to show that here the fiends have mastery. The 
impulse has been given, and man's wickedness works out the plot. In 
a gray and vaulted hall, dimly we discern two figures whispering in 
shadow, and an air-drawn dagger — " on its blade and dudgeon gouts of 
blood which were not so before " — and then, 

" Methought I heard a voice cry, ' Sleep no more, 
Macbeth does murder sleep.' " 

Duncan lies murdered in his bed. Macbeth had made his choice, 
and henceforth to him, 

" Fair is foul, and foul is fair." 

But he had not done " the deep damnation of his taking off " on 
kinsman and king without hesitation and debate. The progress and 
growth of evil is powerfully illustrated in the reaction of guilt by 
which Macbeth and his wife mutually urge each other onward and 
downward. He first touched the fatal spring of her ambition, and 
instantly* her whole nature glowed with the cold intensity of the elec- 
tric light. Then, when he seemed to vacillate before the threats of 
vanquished virtue and an awakened conscience, the spirit he has 
raised in the woman's bosom will not down, but lifts its serpent crest 
to taunt with hissing tongue, and lure and urge him relentlessly to 
the bloody deed. Her hard, cold, narrow, and direct intellect sees no 
end but the diadem, no means but the dagger. Her unbending, yet 
feminine, wickedness employs every stratagem of diabolical rhetoric 
to hold him to his purpose ; she knows him to be fearless, aggressive, 
audacious, and, with a purpose once fully formed, prompt and decisive. 
This was the temper which had made him so dauntless a soldier on the 
field, and so fortunate a commander. To fix that purpose in the con- 
test between conscience and will, she combines a tremendous energy 
with fiendish subtlety. When he seems about to cast aside his dark 
design, she holds him to it by first suggesting it to him as her work, 
not his. 

" He that's coming 
Must be provided for ; and you shall put 
This night's great busiuess into my despatch." 



MACBETH. 259 

She knows him well ; for, once resolved, he truly says : 

"I am settled, and bend up 
Each corporal agent to this terrible feat." 

And so he is led on and on, down the dark and winding stairway 
of death and hell. 

While the poet's function in Macheth was, as I have said, the 
evolution of a moral problem, and not specially the delineation of 
character, yet Shakespeare's absolute artistic perceptions would not 
permit him to portray a character inconsistent with itself. Did time 
permit, I could readily demonstrate this in each person of the drama. 
It is Shakespeare's special gift to condense a whole character and 
display it in a few words, as a flash of lightning, in blackest midnight, 
reveals a landscape. 

Thus, while in Holinshed's Chronicle Banquo is Macbeth's accom- 
plice, the poet, ennobling his character and idealizing his integrity, 
makes him serve a higher purpose. And so we find Banquo described 
by Macbeth, who says of him, 

" There's none but he 
Whose being I do fear." 

And again, 

" Our fears in Banquo 
Stick deep ; and in his royalty of nature 
Reigns that which would be feared : — 'tis much he dares — 
And to that dauntless temper of his mind, 
He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valor 
To act in safety." 

Macduff, " noble, wise, judicious," " child of integrity," and full of 
" noble passion," yet is ever hasty and rash. The gracious and gentle 
Duncan suffers for his childlike trustfulness, while his son, the wary 
Malcolm, exhibits in every word and act the caution and worldly wis- 
dom in which his father is deficient. His prudential virtues receive 
their proper temporal reward, while Duncan, sacrificed on the altar 
of his own credulity, wears the crown of martyrdom. Even in the 
subordinate characters of the play, we find this coherence, as in the 
queen's gentlewoman, who, in her reticence and propriety, is still ever 
a gentlewoman indeed. 

But to my mind the nicest analysis and most careful synthesis 
could not so truly construct a wicked woman, as Shakespeare has 
created one in -Lady Macbeth. The whole gamut of criticism has been 
run by the commentators in characterizing her. From the verdict of 



2G0 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

those who, with the bereaved Malcolm, describe her as " the fiend-like 
queen," we may pass to the opposite view of the German critic, Leo. 
This profound pundit says of her, " the wife, on the other hand, at the 
side of a noble, honorable husband, always faithful to the right, would 
have been a pure and innocent woman, diffusing happiness around her 
domestic circle, in spite of some asperities in her temper." Even this 
genial estimate cannot so far remove prejudice as to enable us to imag- 
ine Lady Macbeth as a pleasant person to have about the house. She 
is a typical murderess : yet she is a woman, not a fiend ; a woman and 
a queen. 

We have seen her finishing the work of overthrowing Macbeth's 
conscience, which the Weird Sisters had begun. She says of Duncan, 

"I could have stabbed him as he slept." 

Yet she did not. There is a vast distance between intensity of desire 
and power of execution. Her feminine nature recoiled from the deed 
itself, though not from its contriving. Unlike Macbeth, she had seen 
no daggers, heard no voices ; but she could not actually stab the sleep- 
ing Duncan. She excuses herself thus, 

" Had he not resembled 
My father as he slept, I had done't." 

Mrs. Siddons, the dark-browed queen of tragedy, fancied that Lady 
Macbeth was " fair, feminine, nay perhaps even fragile," vaulting 
ambition kindling " all the splendors of her dark blue eyes." But 
crime has no special complexion — blonde or brunette — no more than 
has female fascination. 

She is guilty, but a queen, and retains, even under the shadow of 
her inexpiable sin, the lofty refinement of her birth and rank. In the 
horror and confusion of Duncan's death, she swoons. This is the turn- 
ing point in her fate. Then the bubble of ambition bursts. How 
hollow and delusive it all seems now ! 

" Nought's had, all's spent, 
Where our desire is got without content; 
'Tis safer to be that which we destroy 
Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy." 

At first, clinging to the last plank of human sympathy and love 
left from the wreck, she bends herself to the task of consoling her 
husband — but in vain. For herself, nothing is left but remorse. The 
stiff fibre of her pitiless heart had stretched too far — and broken ; but 



MACBETH. 261 

not in repentance, only in the agony of a never-dying dread. The 
hand that a little water was to cleanse bears " a damned spot.' 1 She 

" Is troubled with thick-coming fancies 
That keep her from her rest." 

Walking in her troubled sleep, she cries, 

" What ! will these hands ne'er be clean ? Here's the smell of blood still ; all 
the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh ! " 

Well may the doctor exclaim, 

" What a sigh is there ! the heart is sorely charged." 

Well might she wish herself with pious Duncan in his peace. At 
last there came a cry of women, and the queen was dead. 

At the point of Duncan's doom, Macbeth trembled, and his wife 
chided him as " infirm of purpose." But his man's nature was made 
of the sterner stuff. As he stepped from crime to crime, what with 
the swing of his sceptre and his angry work of repression, he became 
" bloody, bold, and resolute." Baffled by juggling friends, betrayed by 
courtiers and bereft of wife, his heart did not break, nor his brain 
become frenzied. He opposed himself, like a Titan, to the vengeance 
of heaven and the dread of hell— fear of man he never knew. The 
props of infernal prophecy sank under him, and yet he would not fly. 
Then, « championed to the utterance with fate," at the last he falls like 
a soldier, sword in hand, unrepenting and defiant. 

The poetic justice which assigns awakened sensibility as a necessary 
part of the penalty of sin is incorrect. Macbeth displays a more usual 
form of punishment. A gradual hardening of the heart, a constant 
moral descent with neither ability nor wish to recall the lost inno- 
cence, and an increasing catalogue of crimes ensue, until the whip of 
scorpions and the avenging Furies are needed to shake his obdurate 
soul. In him we learn that there is no disconnected sin, but that 
offences are the links in an endless chain, harnessing cause to remotest 
consequence, and dragging the guilt-burthened soul downward forever. 
We saw him at first, with " love, honor, obedience, troops of friends/ 1 
And now, in their stead, 

" Curses not loud but deep, mouth-honor, breath, 
Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not." 

It is thus that Satan fulfils his promises. Even in the moment 
of fruition, when success seemed to have justified his usurpation, he 
received a bitter foretaste of his awful future. Shakespeare does not 



262 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

palter with this aspect of crime. He fills the meed of temporal pros- 
perity for the murderer, crowns him, surrounds his throne with obse- 
quious courtiers, crushes his enemies, and gives him all — 

" Thou hast it now: King, Cawdor, Glamis, all, 
As the weird women promised." 

But he does not give him one happy moment. 
Lady Macbeth says to him, 

" How now, my lord ! why do you keep alone, 
Of sorriest fancies your companions making ? " 

He bewails that they must 

" Sleep 
In the affliction of the terrible dreams 
That shake us nightly; better be with the dead, 
Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace." 

The moral isolation of Macbeth and his wife is marked from the 
moment of his crime. The fissure gradually widens until it becomes 
an abyss of distrust, hatred, and revolt. The thanes fall away, the 
soldiers blench, 

" And none serve with him but constrained things, 
Whose hearts are absent too." 

This moral isolation — this segregation from human sympathy — 
ends in the alienation of the guilty pair ; and their mutual affection, 
once so tender, closes in cold disregard. Selfishness is the essence of 
sin, and in absolute selfishness it finds its consummation. 

Macbeth is a traged}^ indeed. It is the spectacle of a human soul, 
which, under no despotism of destiny, but in the exercise of a lawless 
will, accepts the bribe of the tempter, and thus makes a destiny for 
itself — the destiny of perdition. We see a man of might, with his feet 
planted on a rock. To win a gilded bauble he plunges into the sea. 
He is a strong swimmer in the arms of the whirlpool ; but they are 
arms which will not give up their prey. The lesson of Macbeth is a 
sad and solemn one. It bids us look into the abysses of our own souls, 
lest therein may lurk some motive to tempt us to our doom. And it 
teaches this lesson by exhibiting a human soul — a grand, heroic soul — 
tempted, struggling, betrayed, lost. 

In the words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusa- 
lem : " Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter : Fear God, and 
keep his commandments : for this is the whole duty of man. For 
God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, 
whether it be good, or whether it be evil." 



CERVANTES AND THE DON QUIXOTE. 

BY AUGUSTE D'AVEZAC. 

[Auguste Genevieve Valentin d'Avezac was born in St. Domingo in 1777. Dur- 
ing his childhood he was brought to Louisiana by his parents, refugees from the massa- 
cre in that island, and later was sent to France to be educated. Returning to New 
Orleans, he studied law under his brother-in-law, Edward Livingston. Already noted 
as a criminal lawyer at the time of the British invasion of 1814-15, he served under 
General Jackson as Judge Advocate of the Army during the campaign. The friendship 
resulting from this association influenced D'Avezac's life, and led to an ardent advocacy, 
on his part, of the political fortunes of Jackson, by whom, after the latter's accession to 
the Presidency, he was appointed Secretary of the Legation at the Hague in 1829, and 
Charge d'Aff aires at the same post in 1831. D'Avezac shone equally at the bar, on the 
hustings, and in the lighter walks of literature. He wrote Recollections of Livingston 
(1840). He died in New York, February 15, 1851.] 

The grass had scarcely grown over the humble tumulus under 
which had been laid all of the rector of Meudon that was not genius, 
wit, humor, and knowledge, when Spain, like a field allowed for years 
to lie fallow, and which, skilfully cultivated, yields lavishly the har- 
vests of its long dormant fruitfulness, after she had given birth to 
Gonsalvo, Cortez, Pizarro, and Lope, in a last effort of a still happier 
fecundity brought forth Michael Cervantes Saavedra ! As a young 
horse, intended for the turf, unconscious of his high blood, wastes, in 
early contests with ignoble rivals, the vigor of his limbs, alike flexible 
and strong, the youth threAV his hands on several instruments ere he 
found that which nature and genius had willed that he should strike 
with unrivalled powers. With Galatea, he loitered in shady groves 
and flowery meadows. Nay, such is the waywardness of genius, Cer- 
vantes wrote romances of chivalry. On the stage, too, he strode tri- 
umphant, till Lope de Vega's early laurels taught him, as the strains 
of Byron's lyre taught Scott, in later days, that the art-made poet 
must give way to the Heaven-inspired bard. Cervantes left the arena, 
not ignobly defeated, — superior to all mortal champions, he only 
refused to contend with the god of the Lyre. 

A spectacle of moral sublimity was twice offered to mankind in 
the space of three centuries — two men destined to undying renown, 
erring at the start in their choice of the road leading to immortality. 
But both Cervantes and Scott turned back of their own accord ; and 
before having been outstripped in the race, both declined the combat 



264 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

with a rival in whom each had recognized a master-spirit — recognized 
him by a mystic seal invisible to the crowd, but bright, effulgent, unde- 
niable to the vision of minds of kindred genius. Neither, however, 
felt discouraged or depressed in his own self-appreciation ; each 
returned to the place whence he had sprung, buoyant with noble aspi- 
rations ; each looked around with eagle eye, and marked at last his 
true road to fame ; each, bounding in the lists with undiminished 
vigor, like the god of Homer, in three giant strides, reached the goal. 

Need we say that the Don Quixote appeared ? This was the uni- 
versal book — the book which all who could read, read. As for knight- 
errantry, it had passed away, like a dream of the morning. It fell at 
the first blow. In fact, the war against giants and necromancers was 
but the pretence of Cervantes for taking the field. He pursued his 
triumphant career — no rival there ; like the Macedonian youth, he did 
not lament that he found no more worlds to conquer. His the past, 
the present ; his, too, the endless future. To Lope he had only yielded 
the poetry of metre — the stage of Madrid. His, still, the poetry of 
harmonious prose ; his the boundless poetry of nature, the measureless 
stage where moves the mighty pageant of the world's drama. 

Cervantes seems to have been under the dominion of two potent 
spirits, alternately swaying his mind, and modelling its creations to 
harmonize with their separate and antagonistical nature. One, a 
bright inhabitant of air, bade him to call forth from the depth of his 
imaginings the noblest of beings ; and when, obedient to his com- 
mand, the Knight of La Mancha stood forth, the deluding elf strewed 
his path with flowers of loveliest hue and sweetest perfume ; peopled 
the groves, whose shade he sought, with nymphs and dryads of forms 
divinely fair ; compelled the wind to sigh soft and melodious to his 
ear ; and having persuaded him that the hearts of statesmen beat 
responsive to the promptings of self-denying patriotism, that the 
female breast panted with no other feeling but that of chaste love, 
sent forth the generous champion of virtue, in a world he believed 
modelled in the resemblance of the ideal beauty and goodness, the 
image of which shone lustrous within him — left him there, to be 
buffeted by all the harsh realities of the existing society. 

The other spirit, a gnome kneaded out of the grosser element, as 
to assert his equal sway and mastery over the mind it was given him 
to rule with equally divided power, commanded the poet to produce 
at the same time, and in the same fulness and distinctness of moral 
individuality, as the subordinate companion of the gallant knight, 
another being, differing in every feature, in every propensity, in every 
thought and action, from the one to whom he was doomed to be 
inseparably united in an eternity of renown. The great enchanter 



CERVANTES AND THE DON QUIXOTE. 265 

had but to will, and lo ! Sancho stood by the side of his valorous 
master. The one living but in an ideal world, the other without a 
glimmer of fancy, and with just enough of mind to move about the 
sluggish embodiment, saw what was gross and inelegant, squalid and 
absurd ; and yet by endowing the Squire with good common-sense 
the only quality the Knight had not been gifted with by his Maker' 
Cervantes rendered Sancho no unworthy companion of the learned' 
the eloquent, the high-minded lover of Dulcinea, Nay, in their com- 
munings, the reader knows not which delights him most, whether the 
warrior, embracing earth and heaven in his sublime aspirations, or the 
matter-of-fact Squire, bringing incessantly his wandering interlocutor 
back to the realities of things terrestial. 

In order to form some idea of the effect of such a book on the 
generation on which it beamed at once, without a precursor, we need 
only to recall to our memory the effect which the second reading of it 
had on ourselves. We say the second reading— the first is profanely 
allowed to children, at an age when they cannot enjoy its beauties, 
and scarcely its buffooneries, which are only the mask of profound 
wisdom. 

The trite anecdote told of Philip II., who divined that the poor, 
ill-clad student, whom he saw reading and laughing, held Don Quixote 
in his hands, proclaims at the same time the merit and the contempo- 
rary fame of the work. Even Philip had read the book of the ao-e 
then and now "the book" of Spain. It had made him laugh also— 
not at the quaint sayings of honest Sancho, I wot, but at the credulity 
of the gallant Knight, who believed in virtue ! 



LE SAGE AND THE GIL BLAS. 

BY AUGUSTE d'aVEZAC. 

The appearance of two small volumes had thrown Paris into an 
agitation never witnessed since the wars of the Fronde. A work of 
fiction, written in the simplest and most unpretending prose, had 
taken possession of the public mind. Poetry was unattended to, the 
stage was neglected — even science had suspended its unwearied toils. 
Gil Bias (such was the unostentatious title of the new book) was 
the subject of every thought, the theme of every conversation. 

Poetry ! — what was it in France before Hugo, De Beranger, and 
Lamartine had unbound the young Muse, and set free the beauteous 
limbs of the fair virgin ? The stage ! — what were its stale tragedies, 
its pygmy heroes, half Greek, half French, and bearing no more resem- 
blance to either than some hybrid flower does to the parent plants out 
of whose unnatural union it has sprung, lacking both the perfume of 
one, and the bright colors of the other ? What was the stage, when 
compared with that built by Genius, where the complex drama of the 
human life was acted by actors instinct with all the feelings, the 
motives of the existing society ? Science ! — ever modest, unassuming, 
she stepped aside when the inspired master came forward — the teacher 
of the age ! 

The success of Gil Bias was prompt, but, unlike the lives of plants 
of quick growth, its existence has not been ephemeral ; for as it por- 
trayed man such as his passions will ever make him, when the same 
circumstances bring them into action, time, which only changes what 
is conventional and artificial, has wrought no alterations in the match- 
less delineations of Le Sage. Countless literary reputations have had 
their birth, their precocious growth, and arrived to premature senility, 
and sank into oblivion, even before the pupil of Sangrado had reached 
the full height of his fame. At that full height of renown, after Gil 
Bias had attained it, it has remained for a century and a half — a bright 
star, shedding its rays not over France only, but throughout the civil- 
ized world. Such indeed is the opinion of mankind as to the author 
of that master-work, that Walter Scott, in his Lives of British Novel- 
ists, has placed the name of Le Sage first in his book, adducing as the 
reason of his doing so " that the author of Gil Bias belongs to the 
world, and not to anv one nation." 



LE SAGE AND THE GIL BLAS. 267 

In Spain, where Le Sage has laid the scene of his motley drama, 
the success of the book was even greater than in France. The enrap^ 
tured Castilians fancied their own Cervantes risen from the dead, and 
again making immortal, as Sancho did of old, each village where Gil 
Bias wandered, was cheated or swindled— each city where he cheated 
or swindled in his turn, where he cringed to the great, pandered to 
the vile passions of princes, and brow-beat the humble and the poor ! 

It was not long, however, before Spanish pride suggested the idea 
that no one but a Spaniard could so faithfully have depicted Spanish 
manners ; and that, therefore, the French Gil Bias was but a transla- 
tion of a Spanish original. Absurd as appears the assertion, it has 
prevailed all over Spain, where the translations in Spanish bear the 
title " Gil Bias, restored to the Spanish." 

Instead of attempting a refutation of a paradox so strange, we 
will close the debate, as Franklin did frequently debates of a graver 
cast, by telling you an anecdote. Happy, indeed, could we imitate, 
together with Franklin's practice of using anecdotes instead of syl- 
logisms in polemics, the graceful simplicity with which he told them. 
Voltaire, while in England, was at the opera in the box of an old 
duchess. On the rising of the curtain, a lovely debutante bounded on 
the stage, but stopped suddenly. Her comb had fallen at her feet, and 
her hair, descending almost to the ground, covered her like another 
Danae, with a golden shower. The house rang with loud cheers ; 
all admired, all applauded— all, save the dowager, who, turning to 
Voltaire, said scornfully, " Poh ! These are not her own hairs/' " But 
are they real hairs ? " exclaimed the poet. " Certainly,' 1 replied her 
grace. " Well ! " resumed young Arouet, " they must 'have grown on 
some one's head; and why not, pray, on that "beautiful head which 
they become and adorn so admirably ? " 



BERNAKDIN'S PAUL AND VIRGINIA. 

BY AUGUSTE D'AVEZAC. 

The most beautiful region of the earth had never yet been described 
to the inhabitants of Europe. The luxuriant landscape of African 
isles had found no Ruysdael to mirror them. Their fair maids, born 
of French parents, had bloomed and faded, like the flowers that 
adorned their raven locks, unsung on the lyre — when a young officer 
(Bernardin de St. Pierre), in sight of the Indian and African Oceans, 
whose billows ceaselessly lash the coral rocks of the Isle of France, 
wrote Paul et Virgin ie. The scene of the drama, a small island rising 
out of a boundless sea, like the pyramids out of the sands of the desert 
— the one to proclaim, in smiling loveliness, the sway of God over the 
rebellious elements, the other to testify of the genius of man; the 
actors, two friendless widows with each an only child, an old negro 
man and his wife, and an aged planter — at the same time the spectator 
and narrator of the mournful event. And yet, what scenes of inno- 
cent loves (loves of angels straying awhile on earth) were ever sent 
into the heart with greater power to penetrate, fill, and enthrall it ? 
What poet, of ancient or modern times, ever made tears of deeper 
sorrow to flow, for real or imaginary woes, than those shed by two 
generations at the parting of Virginia from her two mothers, and from 
Paul, whom she still thought that she loved only with a sister's affec- 
tion \ She is gone — a waste of waters roll between the two lovers. 
How we pity the poor child, now immured within the gloom of a con- 
vent ; imprisoned, too, in forms, rules, austerities, uncongenial to her 
nature ! Oh, that we could, through some potent spell, lead by the 
hand the pining maid to her native land ; give her again to the endear- 
ments of maternal love, to the enraptured caresses of the aged servants 
who fostered her infancy ; and seat her by the side of Paul, under 
the shade of the twin palm-trees, planted as memorials of their birth- 
day '• 

Letters from France have reached the lone island ; Virginia writes 
that she will soon return. The vessel by which the letter came had a 
long passage ; only a few days had elapsed after its arrival, when, 
lo! the ship that brings back to her green island the long absent 
maid is in sight— the pilot is already on board — in less than an hour 
it will be safely anchored within the port. But the Avind has died 
away — the sea is smooth like glass ; and yet, at long intervals, from the 



BERNARDIN'S PAUL AND VIRGINIA. 269 

far west, unbroken waves are seen advancing, which, as they slowly 
lift the ship on their tops, make it to strain its cable as if it already 
rode in a storm — a rumbling noise, distant and vague, like that which 
precedes an earthquake — a solemn, fearful stillness — dark, heavy clouds, 
which no breath of air gives motion to — the flight, too, of flocks of 
sea-birds, even of those with strong pinions, the unwearied journeyers 
over the ocean, all hurrying in wild flight and with plaintive shrieks 
to their nests, built in the deep fissures of the towering cliffs which Avail 
the island — these dread omens of a fast-coming tempest had brought 
to the beach, soon after the sun had set in vapors as red as its orb, a 
crowd of tumultuous and alarmed spectators, and among them Paul, 
with his friend the aged planter, who sought to inspire him with 
hopes which his own experience taught him were illusive. Minute- 
guns, the well-known announcement of perils near at hand, added to 
the appalling horrors of that fatal night. 

We dare not to bring a daguerreotype to reflect on this page the 
shadows only of the sublime picture, where a great master has made 
both the scene and the actors visible to all, as they were to him, when 
evoked by his fancy. A loud clap of thunder seemed to have sud- 
denly unshackled the infuriated winds. They come, after careering 
long unresisted over a waste of water ! — they come ! madly driving 
before them mountain waves to overwhelm the stately ship, proudly 
floating, as in defiance of their sway over the sea — now battering its 
solid bow with broken, severed surges in rapid succession — and now 
assailing its swelling sides with the giant strength of mighty billows, 
gathered from afar. Paul, round whose body his friend had fastened 
a strong rope, dashes in every receding wave, with the hope of being 
carried by it towards the ship, still held fast to its mooring by the 
strong cables ; but every time another wave throws him back on the 
beach, bruised and bleeding. Virginia is seen, through the glare of 
the red lightning, on the deck of the St. Ger<m, clad in a white robe, with 
her eyes raised up to heaven, like a martyr waiting for a celestial crown. 
At that moment a bold sailor kneels before the maid ; he entreats her 
to throw off her encumbering vestments, and trust for safety in his 
courage and strength. The chaste virgin gently repels him when he 
attempts to take her in his arms. But, lo ! a dark, swift wave rolls 
on. The experienced eye of the sailor has marked its course. It is 
the coming fate ! Reluctant, he dashes, alone, into the sea. The 
resistless billow rushes against the ship, impetuous bounds over it, but 
breaking as it falls, opens under it a bottomless abyss. All eyes are 
directed to where the St. Geran floated a moment before — no vestige 
is seen of the noble structure — darkness descends, like a curtain, over 
the scene ! 



LA FONTAINE. 



BY CHARLES GAYAKRE. 



Louis Racine [the son of the famous poet of that name] describes 
the physique of La Fontaine and the singularities which characterized 
him in social intercourse with the world. He says : " The great 
fabulist was naturally amiable and gentle in temper, but rough and 
disagreeable in society from his want of manner and from utter 
ignorance of its usages. He never cared to contribute to the pleasure 
of the company he was in ; and on my sisters, who, in early life, had 
frequently met him at my father's table, he had produced no other 
impression than that of his being a slovenly and tedious man. He 
spoke little, or if he spoke at all it was about Plato." 

This description is corroborated by another from the pen of l'abbe 
d'Olivet, who had the fullest opportunity of being well informed on 
the subject. He says : " The physiognomy of La Fontaine gave no 
indication of his talents. It would have been impossible for the most 
sagacious to guess at their existence. His smile had a silly expression, 
his countenance was heavy and dull, his eyes were deadened, and no 
sign of even common intelligence was apparent in his face. Rarely 
did he engage in conversation, and when drawn into it, often it was 
with such absence of mind that evidently he did not know what it 
was about. He fell into a sort of intellectual somnolence. If he had 
been interrogated on what he had been dreaming of, he could not 
have told. If, however, when he happened to be with intimate 
friends, the conversation became animated and controversial, and if, 
in taking a part in it, he warmed up on some point in dispute, then 
his dull eyes sparkled with an unusual light, and for a little while the 
blockhead disappeared and the man of genius was revealed." 

Another writer of the epoch paints La Fontaine with the same 
colors. He represents the poet as being fond of accepting invitations 
to dinner, as eating with voracious appetite and in obstinate silence, 
notwithstanding the efforts made to draw him out. Even Madame 
Cornuel, the famous wit, several times struck with her keen and flash- 
ing blade, without being able to elicit a spark, the rough, unpolished 
rock within which there was concealed so much intellect. He was in 
the habit of taking along with him when he went to some convivial 
entertainment one of his friends named Gaches, and when he was 



LA FONTAINE. 271 

invited to recite some of his fables or tales he invariably answered 
with the awkward air of a silly boy that he did not remember a single 
one, but that Gaches did. Gaches always accepted graciously the 
substitution, and acquitted himself marvelously well of the part im- 
posed upon him. Meanwhile La Fontaine withdrew into the tortoise- 
shell of those reveries, during which he became unconscious of all 
external objects. 

On one of the three days in the Holy Week, when the tenebrce 
are sung in all the Catholic churches, Racine took him to witness that 
religious service, and perceiving that he gave signs of impatience put 
in his hands a volume of the Bible. La Fontaine opened it at random 
and fell on the prayer of the Jews as recorded in the Book of Baruch! 
It excited his intense admiration. 

"What a genius that Baruch was!" he said to Racine "Who 
was he?" 

The next day, and for more than a week afterwards, whenever he 
met anybody, he never failed to sav with much enthusiasm ■ " Have 
you read Baruch? He was a great genius." It was thus his habit 
to take suddenly a violent liking to something or other and to harp 
upon it incessantly. On such occasions it was impossible to call his 
attention to any other subject. 

It was his hobby to praise Rabelais and to put him above all other 
writers, modern or ancient, profane or sacred, except Plato Two 
singular associates, by the bye ! La Fontaine happening to be at the 
house of Boileau with Racine and other persons, one of whom was an 
ecclesiastic, when the conversation turned on Saint Augustin listened 
a long time with the air of a man who evidently did not understand 
one word of the discussion. At last, waking up as it were from pro- 
found sleep, he asked the ecclesiastic, with gravity, whether he thought 
bunt Augustin had as much wit as Rabelais. The priest looked at 
him from head to foot, and his answer was : " Allow me, M de la 
Fontaine, to caU your attention to one of your stockings ' It is put 
on wrong side out." And it was true. La Fontaine did not under- 
stand the sarcasm, and wondered what there could be in common be- 
between a stocking wrong side out and Rabelais compared to Saint 
Augustin. 

It is truly astonishing how unconscious the fabulist was of the 
proprieties of life ! Once he wrote a tale in which a monk played an 
unbecoming part. He took it into his head to dedicate it to the 
famous and austere Arnauld, of Port Royal, the friend of Madame 
de Sevigne, Larochefoucauld, and other distinguished personages 
Arnauld had praised the fables of La Fontaine, who wished to show his 
sense of gratitude by the dedication. Boileau and Racine, to whom 



272 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

he mentioned his intention, were at great trouble to persuade him that 
his tale was impious, and that his intended dedication was an extrava- 
gance, to say the least of it. 

There would be almost no end to the long list of anecdotes relative 
to La Fontaine if we attempted to recite them all. Probably many 
were invented and added to the original stock, which is certainly rich 
enough. But a few more, which are not undeserving of being related, 
are of an authentic character. For instance : Being at the country 
seat of one of his friends, and having gone out early in the morning 
to wander about, according to his custom, he returned long after the 
dinner was over, notwithstanding the warning which he must have 
received from his ferocious appetite about the flight of time. When 
he made his appearance he was asked where he had been and what he 
had been doing. " I come," he replied, " from the funeral of an aunt. 
I followed the procession to the cemetery and accompanied the family 
back to their home." 

One morning the Duchess de Bouillon, going from Paris to Ver- 
sailles, saw La Fontaine under a tree, where he seemed to be plunged 
in one of those reveries which made him insensible and unconscious. 
On her return in the evening she noticed La Fontaine in the same 
place and in the same attitude, although it was very cold and it had 
been raining the whole day. 

There are two anecdotes which are not to his honor. He had for 
years lost sight of his completely forgotten son. One day he met in 
one of the salons of Paris a young man who seemed to attract his 
attention by his deportment and conversation. The youth having 
taken leave and retired, La Fontaine praised him for his taste, wit, and 
erudition. 

" I am glad to inform you," said one of the company, " that this 
accomplished gentleman is your son." 

" Ah ! " exclaimed La Fontaine, " I am quite glad of it," and he 
thought of something else. 

On another occasion, La Fontaine having paid a visit to M. Dupin, a 
theologian of considerable eminence, the latter, on the departure of 
his visitor, accompanied him to the head of the stairs, where a young 
man was ascending at the same time. 

" Sir," said Dupin, to the new-comer, " you find yourself here in 
familiar company, for this is your father whom I am waiting upon." 
The young man bowed with grave formality and passed on. 

" Who is he ? " said La Fontaine. 

" What ! " exclaimed Dupin, " you have not recognized your son ? " 

" Ah," replied La Fontaine, with a vacant stare and an expression 
of dreamy listlessness, " I believe that I once met him somewhere." 



LA FONTAINE. 273 

When the congregation of the Augustins resolved to resist a judi- 
cial decree against them, and to barricade themselves in their convent, 
into which an entrance was to be forced, one of La Fontaine's friends 
met him running in that direction. He was asked whither he was 
going in such haste. He replied with the utmost composure : " I am 
going to see the killing of the Augustins." 

This series of anecdotes is strikingly illustrative of La Fontaine's 
idiocrasy. The following is the last which we shall mention : 

In 1661, at the first representation of his opera Astrea, he was 
seated behind two ladies who did not know him. As the piece went 
on, he from time to time exclaimed : " This is detestable ! " 

" But, sir," said one of the ladies, who lost patience, " this is not 
detestable. The author is a man of taste and talent. It is M. de la 
Fontaine." 

" Well, ladies," continued the unknown, " I assure you that this 
piece is not worth a sou. This La Fontaine whom you praise is a stu- 
pid fellow. It is himself who has the honor of addressing you." 

This is a specimen, among others, of his originality and modesty. 

He went out after the first act and entered a tavern, coffee-houses 
having not yet been established. Sitting down in a retired corner, he 
composed himself to sleep. One of his acquaintances, happening to 
resort to the same place for some refreshment, woke him up and 
expressed astonishment at seeing him anywhere else than at the thea- 
tre where one of his dramatic pieces was being acted for the first time. 
" I have just come from that representation," said La Fontaine, with a 
prolonged yawn. " I stood the first act bravely, although it bored me 
exceedingly. But then I thought that it was time to run away and 
save myself from the infliction of the second act. I admire the patience 
of the Parisians." 

He was an enthusiastic lover of sleep, and could have said with 
Sancho Panza : " Blessed be he who invented sleep ! " He eulogizes 
its happy repose and its still happier dreams in his poem entitled La 
Papimanie — that country " where supremely reigns true sleep, of 
which we have only the semblance." 

" Ah ! par Saint Jean, si Dieu me prete vie, 
Je le verrai, ce pays ou l'on dort. 
On y fait plus ; on n'y fait nulle chose. 
C'est un emploi que je recherche encore." 

" Ah ! by Saint John, if God should prolong my life, I will visit that 
country where man enjoys long sleep, and where, which is still sweeter, 
he does nothing in his wakeful hours. This is the kind of employ- 
ment of which I am still in pursuit." To sleep had become to him a 
passion. 



274 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

He had been throughout his long career completely indifferent to 
any kind of religion. It seems that Nature was the only object of 
his worship. He lived in accordance with what he conceived to be 
her laws. His conscience must have addressed to him no reproach 
when he wrote these two lines : 

"Quand le moment viendra d'aller trouver les morts, 
J'aurai vgcu sans soins, je mourrai sans remords." 

" I have lived an easy life, and shall die without remorse when 
summoned to the habitation of the dead." 

This Avas before he had, in his old age, subjected himself to pain- 
ful austerities, to a systematic mortification of the flesh, and to the 
Avearing of hair-cloth on the skin. 

There is in man an external and visible life, and an internal and 
invisible one. Some of our species live more within themselves than 
outside, being by temperament more addicted to meditation than to 
action. La Fontaine belonged to this latter class, and carried this 
natural disposition to an excess. He had cultivated and indulged it to 
such a degree that he had become almost incapable of meeting effi- 
ciently the obligations, the realities and positiveness of human existence, 
particularly when its exigencies and wants are infinitely increased by 
civilization. His imagination was the enchanted palace of the fairies 
where he loved to revel, after having bolted all the doors and windows 
to exclude the intrusion of all that was not ideal. JSTo knocking from 
without was answered, and it is no wonder, for he was not willing 
to be disturbed. In this internal world of his own, which was as 
thoroughly hidden as if it had been buried in the bowels of the earth, 
he felt himself transformed, and no longer the heavy clod of clay, the 
simpleton, the dotard, avIio was laughed at in the prosaic habitations 
of his fellow-beings. In the diamond-studded halls of his own creation 
he would become the embodiment of taste, wit, sound sense, judgment, 
refinement, and delicacy. There he conversed with gods and god- 
desses and all sorts of supernatural beings, and was ravished into ecstatic 
beatitude by the harp of Apollo and the songs of the Muses. There he 
was in communion with all the heroes and noble spirits of ancient and 
modern times. He summoned them to his presence, and they came. 
He gave audience to animals, birds, fishes, insects, trees, and plants ; he 
understood their language, and he drew under the titles of fables, tales, 
and other names, a sort of proces-verhal of all that occurred in his 
realm of fancy ; whilst now and then, half opening a window of his 
magic dwelling, he flung out with a careless hand a few inspired sheets 
for the delight of mankind. "Whenever he came out of these celes- 
tially illumined halls which he had built for himself, is it strange that he 



LA FONTAINE. 275 

felt dazed, that he talked as if suddenly dropped from the moon, that 
he acted as if out of his senses and as belonging to another world \ In 
fact, he did belong to another world, to which he hastened to return 
as fast as possible. Hence his frequent and long fits of abstraction, 
during which he was perfectly unconscious and impassible. His body 
—that lump of mortality— remained behind, whilst his immortal spirit 
had gone to parts unknown and to the companions of his predilection. 
Thus, when he suddenly was recalled from these Avanderings, the inco- 
herence of his speech, the strangeness of his behavior, and his oblivion 
of the wants, exigencies, and proprieties of civilized life produced 
sometimes a startling effect. On some occasions he seemed to partake 
of the nature of the brute and to be guided by instinct rather than by 
reason. But this was only the outward crust, the coarser material. 
Within this rough-skinned dreamer was a genius as polished and bright 
as a Damascus blade. To his contemporaries he was an incomprehens- 
ible problem, and they called this phenomenon an " inspired idiot." He 
was also surnamed Le bonhomine. This characteristic designation was 
given to him by his friends, by those who knew him best, and who con- 
sidered him the most harmless and helpless of men. " Le bon/wmme " 
La Fontaine is an appellation which will attach to him forever. 



THE OKIGIN OF MYTH. 

BY WILLIAM PRESTON JOHNSTON. 

Though the analogy that maintains a parallel between the develop- 
ment of society and of an individual man may be strained, still it is 
not difficult to trace a resemblance between the historical phases of 
certain races and the successive stages of man's earthly existence. 
Childhood, whether of men or races, rejoices in the marvellous and 
finds marvels everywhere; it sees signs and wonders in heaven and 
earth, and accepts not the soundest but the most striking or obvious 
interpretation of all it sees. Curiosity, creativeness, and the didactic 
instinct are prominent traits in giving impulse to the faculties of the 
young. When artificial and secondary appetites, passions, and desires 
have incrusted our minds, we are astonished at the restless energy of 
childhood in exploring, imitating, and repeating the wonders that the 
world spreads before it. To know, to idealize, and to impart seem the 
business of life. The eager appetite has not learned to be dainty ; it 
devours sweet crudities with uncritical palate. So is it with a race 
whose veins throb with the buoyancy of youth. To the Greeks was 
given a prime full of surprise and questioning and joy. In the flush- 
ing dawn of their national life every one shared in the ceaseless 
demand upon man for the story of the past, and upon nature for an 
answer to the mysteries of the universe. They were not solicitous for 
facts or truths, but craved prompt, pleasing, and plausible responses. 
The deeds of men, the secret forces of nature, and the influences of 
the stars were the subject of story. The appearance of things was 
observed with rapid and delighted glance ; while the idea of law, of 
the regular recurrence of phenomena, did not trouble minds occupied 
with the gorgeous panorama of nature. The excited imagination 
revelled in manifold splendors ; the credulous understanding accepted 
as true all that was told ; the voluble tongue, regardless of the error 
arising from haste, ambiguity, false inference, and exaggeration, 
repeated whatever was most startling or interesting. With such 
elements of variation from sober statement the rapid transformation 
of a fact is not hard to conceive. But this inveracity was not con- 
scious falsehood. The primitive mind does not wilfully propagate it, 
but prefers the truth. Nor does conscious fiction belong to this 
primary phase of the intellect. It is preceded by lisping accents that 



THE ORIGIN OF MYTH. 277 

mean to be truthful, and are so according to the common standard of 
speech used by speaker and listener. There is neither falsehood nor 
fiction, but only the exalted expression of an idealized thought, when 
Lorenzo says to young Jessica : 

" How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! " 

or, 

" Look how the floor of heaven 
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold ! " 

Here there is no misconception between the talkers, but its repeti- 
tion might well involve mistake. In the glow of a young imagination 
golden ideas and words are showered with Olympian lavishness ; nor 
is a Danae lacking to receive on bended knees the fruitful rain from 
which heroes will spring. Soul answers to soul; heart understands 
heart ; thought and language, on however high a key, meet sympa- 
thetic appreciation in minds filled with like emotions. In Greece love 
of marvel enlisted interest in the improbable, and credulity accepted 
it. A narrow range of expression and a limited and concrete vocabu- 
lary gave rise to ambiguity and mistake. "Words intended as meta- 
phorical were taken literally. Mythic expression, with its figurative 
language and poetic thoughts, was necessarily open to misconstruction. 
Thus we see present in the mythopceic age the elements of error in 
the conception of thought and in its embodiment in speech. 

There is in the Myths internal evidence that the intention of the 
myth-makers was truthful and historical. The double circumstance 
that Myth in its earliest form was prose narrative indicates that it 
meant to record facts ; and the relation of its subject-matter to events 
shows that it meant to be historical. Poetry is the language of the 
ideal ; prose, of the real. True, Homer sung ; but it is thereby evinced 
that, though he pretended to tell the deeds of heroes, he idealized them 
in the telling. The earliest forms of the Myths are probably found 
not in these epics, but in the legends told in plain prose at the sanctu- 
aries. These assumed to 'be not only true, but literal. Again, the 
subject-matter of Myth is exactly the same material of which most 
other nations build their early history. The prowess of heroes and 
chiefs, the prodigies of priests and prophets, and the exploits of men 
admirable for strength, courage, and intelligence, have a living interest 
in every age. The recital of these gratifies the pride, prejudice, and 
patriotism of families, tribes, and nations, which transmit and exag- 
gerate the chronicle. The faint line between remarkable and super- 
natural events is easily overlooked, and they are received as equally 
authentic. It is the interest and should be the wish of those who 



278 ESS A YS— MIXED. 

convey religious knowledge to do so correctly ; and, as a rule, such is 
the case. In this the Greek did not differ from other men. If, then, 
the form and subject-matter of Myth are those used in presenting fact, 
and no intention appears to do otherwise, we may fairly presume that 
the intention of the myth-maker was to present fact. 

It has already been pointed out that two classes of subjects occu- 
pied the attention of these prehistoric Greeks ; the one heroic, the 
other supernatural. In considering the origin of Myth, it may be well 
to handle these separately. In order to comprehend the birth of the 
Heroic Myth, Ave should recall the earliest known social organization 
of the Greeks. They were clustered into a multitude of petty, inde- 
pendent tribes, each under its own king and nobles, who were sup- 
posed to be of divine or heroic descent. "Whether this conviction was 
the result of conquest, priestcraft, or other cognate causes, avails not 
here to inquire ; but the fact remains that to their aristocracy was 
accorded a superiority of race. There is a universal tendency to dwell 
upon and commemorate the words and deeds of the great, to generalize 
under their names the efficient causes of remarkable events, and to 
attribute to them transcendent vigor, wisdom, and virtue. If this be 
true ordinarily, it is so more markedly in a community governed by an 
aristocracy of ampler endowments. The intellectual prostration of the 
Peruvians before their Incas, and the legends of Manco Capac, are 
familiar illustrations. Now, the early Greeks regarded their royal 
houses with a similar respect, and employed all their immature but 
aspiring talents to eulogize their chiefs. As children look with loving 
and reverential eyes upon their parents, trusting to their unbounded 
resources, so these simple-hearted people, upon whom skepticism had 
not laid its blighting finger, paid filial and fervent homage to the 
father and elders of the nation. To rehearse their exploits, to extol 
their merits, and to preserve their fame, were the artless themes to 
which were devoted abilities that in maturer societies spread their 
energies into every manner of literary production. To hand down a 
true account of what has actually occurred, to perpetuate real trans- 
actions, this is the object of histor}^ ; and this also was the aim of those 
primeval Greeks, whose efforts, however, resulted in Myth. The nu- 
cleus or germ of most Myths originally embodied a heroic biography, 
as conceived and treated by a credulous, imaginative people. I say 
germ, because the original shape of a Myth can now scarcely even be 
guessed at. In the lapse of ages these rude essays at narrative were 
mingled with so much added falsehood that a minimum only of truth 
remained. Professor Tyndall has eloquently described the resplendent 
effects of light displayed through the medium of matter present in the 
atmosphere, but of a tenuity invisible by the microscope. Somewhat 



THE ORIGIN OF MYTH. 279 

akin to this is matter-of-fact in Myth. It is there, imponderable in 
human action, undiscernible by scientific research, and yet imparting 
a depth, a clearness, and a brilliancy of coloring that the rarer medium 
of fiction does not possess. So close does Myth lie to the purely fabu- 
lous that it merges into it as twilight into darkness. 

So hard has it been to discover in Myth any trustworthy facts 
based upon a solid foundation of evidence that some judicious explorers 
have refused to search for a historical basis where they believed none 
to exist. Their critical tests dispel it in vapor. Again Ixion aspires 
to woo Here, and is cheated by a cloud ; again he seeks the unsullied 
majesty of truth, and clasps the dissolving mist. It was after such 
failures that Grote regretfully declared mythology to be " a past that 
never was present." He declined the attempt to withdraw the curtain 
and disclose the picture, with the reply of Zeuxis, " The curtain is the 
picture." He banished Myth to the region of Fancy, whence he 
thought it had sprung. Yet the amount of error subsequently intruded 
is sufficient, as will be shown, to account for the difficulty, not to say 
impossibility, of discovering the underlying truth. Max Miiller,Cox, 
and their school have rendered service in this at least, that they have 
shown that some of the Myths are explicable by philology ; and if so, 
why not others by other processes ? In the contemplation of the im- 
pressive solar Myths, and of the ingenious allegories of a later age, we 
must not forget, however, that more than half the Myths afloat in 
Hellas related to the deeds of heroes. 

A feature of the Heroic Myth, not to be neglected, is that it was 
local. It belonged to the place and the tribe. It was of the vicinage, 
not of the nation. In each little district it was similar to, but not the 
same as in others. It varied in names and particulars, according to its 
cradle. Its manifestations in symbol and story differed as individuals 
of a class, yet the generic resemblance remained. In the palmy days of 
the My thus there was no system of mythology ; and, indeed, none ever 
existed except in the treatises of philosophers, when it was no longer a 
faith, but a civil institution. This generic likeness of Myths in places 
widely apart, with specific discrepancies even among neighbors ; this 
importance of locality, as an element of diversity, would seem to indi- 
cate a general cause rather than a common origin of these inconsistent 
Myths. They seem to have arisen out of a prevalent state of things, 
rather than to have been modifications of a few legends, to which 
some theorists would reduce them. In a word, though the position is 
not indisputable, it may be safely asserted that the recital of early 
heroic action is the greatest, though not the sole, source of Heroic 
Myth. The actual'deeds of real men were the fountain-head whence 
flowed a stream of tradition that gradually changed by the mingling 



280 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

of many waters, till the pure element of truth was lost in a flood of 
fable and fiction. 

But it is too narrow a view of the divine energy of the intellect to 
suppose that even in its infancy it can rest content with human trans- 
action as its only food. All the questions that agitate a maturer epoch 
start unbidden, and must have their answer. The problems of God 
and Man, of Pain and Evil and Destiny and Death, call out to the 
heart and understanding for solution. The readiest, most ingenious, 
and most surprising answer is the most satisfactory. The riddling 
song of a strolling minstrel, the imported dogma of a foreign priest, 
or the plausible guess of some inchoate philosopher are adopted as 
beliefs with equal avidity. The phenomena of day and night and of 
the revolving seasons had to be accounted for ; the creation of the 
world and of man invited curiosity ; the power and powerlessness of 
the human will in collision with invisible influences demanded explana- 
tion. The unravelling of all these physical and spiritual facts was that 
of children. Whatever was stirring in the mind of early Greece 
assumed the form of Myth ; that is to say, of childlike thought in 
childlike speech. Religious and moral ideas, the works of Nature, cos- 
mogonic theories, all causes and agencies, found mythic expression. 
This converted all powers and existences into persons, and all relations 
into actions.* A complete body of primitive thought, therefore, is con- 
tained in mythology ; but it has put on a garb of flesh, and is energized 
into a spurious history of divine and human action. 

To understand the manner in which the Greeks realized their 
mythical beliefs we must remember the intensity of their imaginative 
and personifying powers, and the phase of speech in which these ideas 
were represented. This undeveloped language, half narrative, half 
poetic, was the natural and appropriate vehicle for the thoughts it 
conveyed. I lately saw a girl of five years bring from her garden a 
bunch of pink morning-glories. " They are all dressed in the fashion- 
able pink," said she ; " I wonder how they knew it was the fashionable 
color ; I am sure I didn't tell them." Here was no self-deception, for 
the child was well aware that she held in her hand inanimate blos- 
soms ; but there was an actual and perfect personification, a recogni- 
tion of the mysterious may-be that underlies the whole external world 
of matter. The activity of the Greek fancy carried this into every 
object of nature. The circulating sap siipplied to the trees not only 
vegetable life, but conscious existence ; the fountain's spray veiled the 
spirit of the waters ; the great bosom of the ocean itself heaved with 
contending passions, and shook its rocky barriers with a purpose. The 
impulse to wrath or joy or love became the suggestion of an unseen 

* Vide K. 0. Miiller's Scientific Introduction to Mythology . 



THE ORIGIN OF MYTH. 281 

being to whom these qualities were a soul or animating principle. 
The sun rose and made his daily circuit under the guidance of a pres- 
ent deity ; and Zeus compelled the cloud and hurled the thunderbolt, 
while he ruled supreme over gods and men. The idea of Divine 
causation seems to have been evolved from the pressure of a great 
want on the minds of these simple folk ; of a great want, and of an 
unseen presence making itself felt in all the operations of nature. Or 
is this only another way of saying with St. Paul, " For the invisible 
things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being 
understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and 
Godhead " ? Is it strange that, perceiving the diverse manifestations 
of the Divine energy, they should have assigned each to a cause which 
with them became a person ; and yet could not, through the darkness 
of their " vain imaginations and foolish hearts," look beyond to a 
First Great Cause \ The personification of the powers of nature and 
their worship were the necessary results of these tendencies. They 
" changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made 
like to corruptible man." It seemed reasonable to them to attribute 
whatever was unusual or important to a supernatural cause, and to 
ascribe to their gods a constant intervention in the affairs of men. 
Whatever was thus ascribed entered into the beliefs of the people 
and became part of the traditionary mythus. Moreover, though these 
mythopoeic Greeks desired truth, it was as they loved the beautiful, 
the wonderful, and other ideas. Hence, with this divided aspiration 
for truth, with radiant imagination, with vivid personification, and 
with these tendencies to impute every unwonted incident to super- 
natural causes, it is not strange that the Greeks peopled land and sea 
and sky with a host of demons and deities, giving to each " a local 
habitation and a name," a life of action and a personal biography. 
This was the supernatural mythus in its inception. At a later day 
these habits of mind pervading an entire population developed into 
an allegorizing tendency, a conscious and constructive phase of per- 
sonification that converted prevalent sentiments or institutions into 
personal or particular facts, and embodied abstract and general rela- 
tions and ideas in concrete forms. 

But these were not the only sources of error, nor the only forces 
conducing to that transfusion of the fabulous into the pure element 
of history which replaced its clear light with the prismatic splendors 
of Myth. The critical faculty that ponders statements, weighs evi- 
dence, and discriminates relations was as yet unborn. No effort was 
made to define with exactness notions put forth in crude forms of 
speech. Figurative language was transformed by literal rendering 
into extravagant stories. I have heard a soldier say, " I tell you, the 



282 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

general looked ten feet high." In the lapse of time and tongue and 
tradition a mythic epoch would have extolled the gallant commander 
as actually ten feet tall. While mythic expression was the fittest die 
to stamp the intellectual treasures of that age into current coinage, still 
its spirit and form tended to render it misleading, especially in case of 
a want of mental sympathy between speaker and listener. The half- 
interpreted archaisms and solecisms of bards, reciting in kindred but 
unfamiliar dialect, entered into prose as literal facts. Such importance, 
indeed, does Max Miiller's school give to these philological grounds 
of error, that they have set up as a cardinal formula " that mythology 
is only a dialect, an ancient form of language." Their theory is that 
the operations of nature, and especially the solar phenomena, were 
chanted by primitive poets in bold metaphors ; and that these gradu- 
ally lost their poetical and finally their radical meanings, and remained 
imbedded in Myth only as proper names. They assert that the key to 
the mythological names and stories is found in the Sanskrit tongue, 
the hymns of the Yedas, and the description of the aspects of nature 
— especially of the sun. An unconscious allegory that may be called 
the sun epic — the Phcebiad — is made to occupy almost the whole ground 
that the fertile fancy of the Greeks has strewn thick with flowers. 
Doubtless some of the earlier Myths have been thus interpreted cor- 
rectly ; and some of the later fabricated Myths, which allegorized 
astronomical ideas, have been thus unveiled : but the great success of 
these scholars has led them to magnify the importance of this element 
of myth-generation. They fancy that they hold the cleAv to the whole 
labyrinth, forgetting how many of the Myths are only secondary ; out- 
growths, drawing a sort of plant-life from the decayed organisms of 
earlier Myths, and hence inscrutable to every kind of analysis. It can- 
not be that the primal poems of mankind, filtered through ages of 
migration, conquest, and commercial transfer ; through shiftings of 
races, confusions of tongues, and kaleidoscopic minstrelsy and story- 
telling, whether decomposed by the tests of historical credibility or 
of philological ingenuity, will at the bidding of science rise again 
restored in its first form. Art cannot renew the rose from its ashes. 
The palingenesis of the phoenix is altogether fable. 

Two causes that helped to produce and confirm a belief in appari- 
tions, and hence in the entire mythology vouched for by them, have 
been left out of account by the critical mythologists. These are hallu- 
cination and optical illusion. It is forgotten that men see ghosts. It 
is not impossible to see things simply because they do not exist. Phan- 
toms and spectres do appear, and imagination alone will not account 
for them. The truth is that it is quite common to behold with the 
eye the image of what subsists in the mind only. The victims of 



THE ORIGIN OF MYTH. 283 

vi an i a apotu, after recovery, distinguish what fantasy imprinted on 
the retina during the delirium from real objects then seen only bv 
inquiry or the contradiction to their ordinary experience. The eve in 
such cases, by a retroactive process, sees the picture in the brain. But 
there are so many well-attested instances of hallucination in the records 
of modern medical science that it will scarcely be denied as a psycho- 
logical fact. A sensible man who sees a ghost goes at once to see 
his physician also, who exorcises the intruder with blisters, cathartics, 
and the like. The doctor does " minister to a mind diseased." But o-o 
to the highlands of Scotland, where ancient and popular credence cor- 
roborates the second-sight of the seer as a veritable vision, and you 
will find the mental disorder cherished as a fatal gift, and the super- 
stition systematized into a cultus. So with the Greeks, whose splendid 
and creative imaginations pictured in clouds and foliage, sea-foam and 
mountain-mist, the bright beings their hearts desired : when hallucina- 
tion came it beamed upon them in grand and beautiful dreams, that 
evinced at the same time the popular belief and the character of the 
national genius. 

Distinct from hallucination, the product of mingled mental and 
physical aberration is optical illusion, which depends upon conditions 
purely physical and often entirely external. Eiding on the plains of 
Western Texas, when a vertical sun was pouring its blaze over the 
boundless, flower-embroidered expanse, my eyes have caught the sheen 
of distant waters and the likeness of a lake smiling in the landscape. 
It was the mirage of the desert, which receded as I approached ; and 
the dusty trail led through tracts that fantasy had painted with the 
pencil of the sun. And yet here the beholder is less the artist than 
Nature herself. Shallow tourists, stolid sailors, and hard scientists 
concur in bearing witness that the counterpart of ship and headland 
are lifted by an unseen hand to the clouds and poised in the firma- 
ment. ' The Giant of the Brocken mocks alike the gesture of bagman 
and poet. In a word, optical illusions occur in such number and under 
such varied conditions as to teach that the eye cannot be trusted. It 
is notoriously unequal to the detection of legerdemain and other jug- 
gling devices, in which the hand out-travels the sight. Vision is an 
arch-deceiver and delights in tricks on the credulous intellect. When 
the Greeks worshipped Artemis and Dionysus they wove with verdure 
and sunshine a mantle of waving green for the flitting form of the 
Nymph, or caught in glimpses of the bounding goat outlines of a 
pursuing Satyr. Such optical illusions were heightened by the 
strong emotions and sensitive organizations of the Greeks. Battles 
in the clouds have been seen by unjaundiced eyes. One such prece- 
dent might serve a Homer as assurance for the divine machinery 



284 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

of the Iliad; and one Iliad might well mould the faith of a 
people. 

I know not of any mythologist who has described more truly or 
beautifully the birth of Myth than "Wordsworth in the Excursion : 

"In that fair clime the lonely herdsman, stretched 
On the soft grass through half a summer's day, 
"With music lulled his indolent repose ; 
And in some fit of weariness, if he, 
"When his own breath was silent, chanced to hear 
A distant strain, far sweeter than the sounds 
Which his poor skill could make, his fancy fetched, 
Even from the blazing chariot of the sun, 
A beardless youth who touched a golden lute 
And filled the illumined groves with ravishment. 
The nightly hunter, lifting up his eyes 
Toward the crescent moon, with grateful heart 
Called on the lovely wanderer who bestowed 
That timely light to share his joyous sport; 
And hence a beaming goddess with her Nymphs 
Across the lawn and through the darksome groves 
(Not unaccompanied with tuneful notes, 
By echo multiplied from rock or cave) 
Swept in the storm of chase, as moon and stars 
Glance rapidly along the clouded heaven 
When winds are blowing strong. The traveller slaked 
His thirst from rill or gushing fount, and thanked 
The Naiad. Sunbeams upon distant hills 
Gliding apace with shadows in their train 
Might, with small help from fancy, be transformed 
Into fleet Oreads sporting visibly. 
The Zephyrs, fanning, as they passed, their wings, 
Lacked not for love fair objects, whom they wooed 
With gentle whisper. Withered boughs grotesque, 
Stripped of their leaves and twigs by hoary age, 
From depth of shaggy covert peeping forth, 
In the low vale or on steep mountain-side ; 
And sometimes intermixed with stirring horns 
Of the live deer, or goat's depending beard — 
These were the lurking Satyrs, a wild brood 
Of gamesome deities ; or Pan himself, 
The simple shepherd's awe-inspiring god ! " 

It is unnecessary to dwell upon the element of conscious falsehood 
and imposture in the formation of Myth. It has entered there, of 
course, as it does into most historical records, and into much of human 
transaction. In an age and race at once credulous and not earnestly 
truthful, lying would often prove successful ; but it would still remain 
the least interesting, permanent, and coherent part of Myth. 



THE ORIGIN OF MYTH. 285 

If the opinions now advanced are well founded, we are forced to the 
conclusion that the very origin of Myth was so involved with miscon- 
ception of fact, of a blending of the real and ideal, and with the vague- 
ness and inconsistency of a budding language, that if we could hear 
now the voice of the heroic age and understand its words and phrases, 
the mental idiom of its speech would puzzle our modern complexity by 
its directness and candor. In the long centuries that followed, error 
submerged the mythus with the froth and often with the filth of fable, 
till the truth in it is as hard to find as a jewel lost in a bog. But the 
value of the study of mythology as an aid to history fortunately does 
not depend upon our finding the truth in it. On the contrary, we have 
effected somewhat when we discover how the error got there ; and 
again, we have achieved more if, in apprehending the moral and mental 
phases that revealed the mythus, we realize the psychology of an age 
and a race. No one can estimate, moreover, the fructifying power of 
this spring-pollen of the intellect until it has been borne in upon his 
own thought. Then will he joyfully confess that those young-eyed 
Greeks had a vigor and stress and reach of imagination and a latent 
suggestiveness of thought that prefigured their high estate in the 
domain of mind. Then will he gladly add his voice to the general 
acclaim that hails them as the vanguard of human progress. 



THE BOOK-MEK 

BY T. WHARTON COLLENS. 

[Thomas Wharton Collens was born in New Orleans, June 23, 1812. As a very 
young man he edited the True America. In 1840 he was elected District Attorney of 
the Orleans District of Louisiana. In 1842-46 he was Judge of the City Court of New 
Orleans, and in 1856 was elected Judge of the First District Court of the same city. 
In 1868 he was made Judge of the Seventh District Court of the Parish of Orleans ; this 
position he held until the court was abolished in 1873. He was the author of Humanics 
(1860) and the Eden of Labor (1876), two philosophical works which have stood well with 
judicious critics. While scarcely more than a boy he wrote the Martyr Patriots, or 
Louisiana in 1769, an historical tragedy which, shortly after its publication, was suc- 
cessfully performed at the old St. Charles Theatre. (Vide page 421.) Judge Collens 
died in New Orleans, November 3, 1879.] 

"What a vast difference there is between us and our ancestors who 
lived three thousand years ago ! What savages they were ! What a 
polished people are we ! Surrounded by all the glories and lights, 
blessings and hopes of civilization, we can hardly realize the fact that 
we are the descendants of men who roamed in forests and deserts, of 
men as ignorant, superstitious, wild, and brutal as the Comanche 
Indians. Such, nevertheless, is the fact ; and the question naturally 
arises : How, through the ages, have our ancestors been able to over- 
come their abject condition, and rise to the heights of knowledge and 
art, to survey an immense horizon of truth, and use the magical boun- 
ties of invention ( Did the light break upon us all at once ; did we 
get all the superior advantages of science and art we now enjoy from 
a single hand or from one inspiration, or was the process not only slow 
and gradual, but difficult and terrible ? To what or to whom do we 
owe this great change, this wonderful transformation of the mind, 
manners, and labors of the human race ? 

We answer at once : The progress of man from the savage to the 
civilized state of society and to its functions and uses was indeed slow 
and arduous, and is due to the studies of solitary, thinking book- 
men, careful theorists, or inquisitive philosophers, who, in each genera- 
tion, and one after the other, have promulgated the result of their 
meditations. 

Understand us — we mean what we say : we say book-men, we say 
theorists • and, if humor prompts, it may add contemptuous epithets to 
the terms. We may say, if we choose, mere book-men, mad theorists, 
or dreamy philosophers, and still the proposition would be true. 




T. WHARTON COLLENS. 



THE BOOK-MEN. 287 

To demonstrate this truth we might begin with primeval man, go 
through ancient history, tracing the march of mind from the mythic 
Hermes of Egypt, the Pythagoras of Greece, the Zoroaster of Persia, 
to the grand display of civilization exhibited by the Roman Empire 
under Aurelius Antoninus, or under Constantine the Great, and thence 
follow the current in all its vicissitudes down to the present age. But 
the limits of a single article preclude so extended a review of human 
progress. Hence, we are compelled to select, if possible, a period of 
history within which a fair illustration of the march of mind may be 
found (leaving out former and subsequent ages), to test other periods 
by the same laws of development. Let us, therefore, begin in the 
middle of the middle ages, that is to say, in the year 800 after Christ, 
and finish with the discovery of America, in the fifteenth centurv. 
From this first point our premises will be apparent. At the last point 
our conclusion will be reached ; and then all the consequences, as 
applicable to modern times, will show themselves as clearly as the 
landscape in the light of day. 

In the year 800 after Christ, what was the state of Europe ? The 
Goths, the Vandals, the Franks, the Huns, the Normans, the Turks, 
and other barbarian hordes, had invaded and overthrown the Roman 
Empire, and had established various kingdoms upon its ruins. These 
hordes of savages had destroyed not only all the works of civilization, 
but civilization itself. Ignorant as they were of everything that dis- 
tinguishes and elevates human nature, they broke up the schools, 
ruined the monuments, abolished arts and manufactures, prevented 
commerce, and reduced the conquered nations to their own condition, 
inaugurating in the completest manner the reign of brute force and 
mental darkness. If they afterward espoused Christianity, they 
moulded it to their own savage superstition, till at last naught was left 
of the divine dispensation but its name, to cover the most degrading 
idolatry and demonism. At the time we begin our specific examina- 
tion we find that, in the then so-called Christian nations — 

1. There existed no science worthy of the name, no schools what- 
ever. Reading, writing, and ciphering were separate and distinct 
trades. The masses, the nobility, the poor and the rich, were wholly 
unacquainted with the mysteries of the alphabet and the pen. A few 
men, known as clerks, who generally belonged to the priesthood, 
monopolized them as a special class of artists. They taught their 
business only to their seminarists, apprentices ; and beyond themselves 
and their few pupils no one knew how to read and write, nor was it 
expected of the generality, any more than it would be nowadays that 
everybody should be a shoemaker or a lawyer. Kings did not even 
know how to sign their names, so that when they wanted to subscribe 



288 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

to a written contract, law, or treaty, which some clerk had drawn up 
for them, they would smear their right hand with ink, and slap it 
down upon the parchment saying, "Witness my hand." At a later 
date, some genius devised the substitute of the seal, which was im- 
pressed instead of the hand, but oftener besides the hand. Every 
gentleman had a seal with a peculiar device thereon. Hence the sac- 
ramental words now in use, " Witness my hand and seal," affixed to 
modern deeds, serve at least the purpose of reminding us of the igno- 
rance of the middle ages. 

In fact, in those days a nobleman considered it below his dignity to 
have any knowledge of letters. This was left to persons of inferior 
rank. The use of arms, horsemanship, and war were the sole avoca- 
tion of the lords of the land. As all authority, and indeed safety, 
depended upon force and success in battle, skill at arms was necessa- 
rilv the genteelest of the arts. The nobility knew no other ; and the 
workmen they admired the most were those who forged their uncouth 
armor, ungainly shields, and clumsy swords. 

Society was divided into orders : at the top were the prelates and 
priesthood, the kings and nobles ; at the bottom the serfs, who were 
the bulk of the people ; and intermediate were a few free workmen 
and burgesses, who enjoyed a sort of quasi exemption from personal 
servitude, but were subject to the despotic rule of the king and lords. 

All persons were also unmitigated believers in magic, sorcery, 
witchcraft, enchantments, amulets, astrology, evil-eye, conjuration, 
fascination, divination, fetichism, charms, evocation of ghosts, spectres 
and devils, talismans, incantations, fortune-telling, palmistry, cabalistic 
arts, spells, divining-rods, bargains with the occult powers, and the 
like. Even in our time vestiges of the like belief exist among us, but 
then it was universal and denied by none, whether prince, priest, or 
populace. There is no parallel to this state of things in modern times, 
except in the interior towns of Africa. 

It was then universally conceded that the nobles were men of a 
superior race ; that their blood was different and purer than that of 
other men. All the land belonged to them. No one doubted their 
title. The population of every barony considered the baron as their 
rightful master, holding his authority from God himself. It was next 
to sacrilege to disobey him. Yet these barons were brutal, extortion- 
ate, and cruel. They were constantly at war with each other, and 
therefore lived in fortified castles, whence they now and then sallied 
to levy contributions among their own serfs, rob passengers and cara- 
vans on the highway, or plunder and burn the property or massacre 
the people of neighboring fiefs. They had the right of life and death 
over their vassals. These could not marry or travel without their 



THE BOOK-MEN. 289 

permission. The maidens of the baronies were obliged to gratify the 
lusts of the baron whenever he took a fancy to any of them ; and this, 
so far from being considered as an act of outrageous despotism, was 
generally accepted as an honor conferred. No Turkish pacha or Rus- 
sian boiar holds now greater power than the feudal lords possessed 
and abused during the middle ages. They exacted and took the first, 
the largest, and the best products of the labor of the people ; and none 
(not even those who were the victims of unscrupulous tithes, tribute, 
and pillage) ever suspected that the nobles exceeded their divine and 
rightful privileges. The people, when robbed, or put to the rack, 
might think their lord was a hard and cruel master ; but his right to 
do as he pleased was to every mind unquestionable. 

The laws which then existed (if indeed the name of law could be 
justly applied to such an ordination of society) were only such as were 
calculated to maintain the power and fortune of the tyrants we have 
just described. Murder was punished only when the culprit was a 
villain, or a man of inferior rank to that of his victim ; and then the 
punishment was graded, so that the murder of a noble or priest by a 
villain or inferior was avenged by the most revolting and agonizing 
tortures and death ; while if, on the contrary, the victim was a villain 
and the homicide a nobleman, a few pence was the price of blood. 
Trials there were none worthy of the name. They tested the guilt or 
innocence of those who were suspected of offences by various super- 
stitious practices, such, for instance, as making the supposed offender 
walk over red-hot ploughshares. If he got burned, he was guilty ; if he 
passed over unscathed, he was innocent. The favorite mode of decid- 
ing causes before the courts was the trial by battle. The parties were 
made to tight it out, but not always with equal arms. The villains 
were permitted only to wield the club, while the gentry entered the 
lists sword in hand, clothed in armor, and on horseback. The result 
of the combat was religiously believed to be " the judgment of God " 
between the parties. 

We have said that in those ages no science existed. Let us add 
that it was then universally taken for certain truth that the earth was 
flat ; that the skies were a dome of hard adamant, which enclosed and 
covered the world like the walls and roof of a building ; that the stars 
were occult beings having good or evil influences over men ; that the 
winds and the floods, the rain and the crops, were either special dis- 
pensations of Providence, independent of any original design or law, 
or were, when unfavorable, the act of evil spirits or magical operations. 
The monuments of Roman architecture were allowed to go to ruin. 
The art of building had been almost forgotten, and was limited to the 
erection of rough and uncouth fortresses and walls suited to keep men 
19 



290 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

and horsemen at bay. These were usually located on the tops of 
almost inaccessible rocks. The people lived in huts ; they ate with 
their hands ; food was cooked without pots or kettles, on the embers, 
or roasted on spits. Candles were unknown ; stockings were un- 
known ; clothing was made of dressed skins ; and, though some woven 
fabrics were made by means of hand-looms, they were so inferior that 
the ordinary stuffs worn by the people of the present day would have 
been then considered as luxurious finery fit for a king to wear. 

We forgot also to mention, in relation to the trial by battle, that 
the lawyers of those days did not gain their suits by means of evi- 
dence, authorities quoted out of books, and speeches or arguments 
addressed to the courts ; but the lawyers were men-at-arms, expert in 
the use of the sword, the lance, the mace, and the baton • and the 
parties, when they were able, would hire them to fight out the case in 
the arena as gladiators. Thus the case would be decided in favor of 
him whose lawyer beat, or cut down, or unhorsed his adversary's 
lawyer. Those were indeed the days when might was right. 

Our object in giving this sketch of the state of civilization in the 
eighth and ninth centuries is to contrast the condition of society then 
with what it is now, and to inquire how mankind could emerge from 
that order of things to the present stage of human progress. By what 
means were barbarism, universal ignorance, and superstition to be 
overcome ? From whom was the first light to come ? Who was to 
take the first step toward a better order or higher knowledge ? 

The impediments were of the most formidable character. Every- 
body was ignorant, except the few clerks, or clergymen, we have men- 
tioned, and even the range of their knowledge, beyond theology, was 
very limited. All around them was darkness, and naught indicated 
even a gleam of light or liberty. 

By whom or when was the first step taken ? By the very clerks 
or book-men we have mentioned, during the reign of Charlemagne in 
France, and that of Alfred in England. Long had they labored in 
the solitude of their cloisters to enlarge the scope of their learning. 
Assiduously had they multiplied copies of precious manuscripts and of 
their own works. Zealously had they striven to find laymen willing 
to purchase and study those works and listen to their instructions. 
At last they persuaded Charlemagne to establish a school in Paris, and 
Alfred to found a university at Oxford, in order to educate aspirants 
for the priesthood and form doctors of theology. Nothing was 
thought of but to cultivate the kind and extent of learning then 
existing. It was natural to procure for these schools copies of all the 
books then to be found. Few, indeed, were these — as brief sketches 
of Latin grammar, a few Latin vocabularies, a meagre treatise on 



THE BOOK-MEN. 291 

arithmetic and geometry, and a stray copy of the philosophical work 
by Porphyry, and another by Boetius. The rest was all Christian 
theology and philosophy, such as the works of St. Augustine and 
other fathers, besides the Bible and the canons of the Church. The 
savant chosen for Paris was the monk Alcuin, and the scholar selected 
for Oxford was another monk, Grimbaldus. 

The deed was done. A school was established. Men were offered 
a great opportunity of becoming book-worms, and consequently to 
think and theorize. The result was inevitable. To meditate, they 
had to exercise their reasoning faculty, while they studied the philos- 
ophy they found in the few books they had, and pondered over theol- 
ogy — theology and ancient philosophy as harmonized with dogma. 

One of the teachers who succeeded Alcuin was a doctor of philos- 
ophy named John Scotus Erigenus, an Irishman by birth. He wrote 
philosophical treatises in which a new question was raised. This ques- 
tion was, whether an abstract term or a word — such, for instance, as 
the word " humanity'" — represented a real being ; an essence in nature ; 
a real and single thing existing independent of any individual. Not 
whether there were many individual men included by a process of 
thought under a general name, but whether that general name " hu- 
manity " was not the name of a reality, antecedent in creation and in 
time to the existence of any individual — antecedent to Adam himself. 

Yain as this question would seem, it raised a great debate among 
the clerks and doctors. Soon parties were formed among them, pro 
and con. The one party got the name of Realists, the other that 
of Nominalists. Minds became excited, curiosity was aroused. In 
order to prove one opinion or the other, information was sought in 
ever} 7 direction. Every scrap which could be found of Plato's and 
Aristotle's works was rescued from oblivion, and quoted as authority 
by one or the other side. Other ancient books were disinterred. The 
si i runts began to investigate natural phenomena, and, above all, to 
closely scrutinize man himself, physically and intellectually. 

Though the question in debate might appear at this day quite 
frivolous and easily answered, yet in those times it was necessary as a 
first step in the progress of getting rid of the fundamental errors and 
prejudices prevalent even among the savants. We must not lose sight 
of the mental condition of all men in those times. If we keep this 
in view, we shall, instead of despising the men who first put the ques- 
tion just stated, wonder how at that stage of intellectual progress it 
could have suggested itself to any mind. Certain it is that the most 
learned (so small was their amount of science, and so peculiar were 
the settled opinions of their age) were not ready to discuss other 
subjects. 



292 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

They soon brought their discussions before their pupils, and from 
among these the debate found its way into society : kings, nobles, 
and burgesses talked about it, and as a consequence talked about the 
points of knowledge necessary to solve the question. This was a 
slow operation indeed. It took eight centuries before the controversy 
was settled. 

Yet, in time, hundreds of other questions grew out of this single 
one, and it became necessary to settle all the minor objections and 
issues before the main one could be concluded upon. What is soul ? 
what is mind ? what is reason ? what is feeling ? what is sensation ? 
what is knowledge ? what is man and his destiny ? what is revelation 
in contradistinction to science ? how far can science go without re- 
quiring the aid of revelation ? is man a free agent ? are all men of the 
same species ? what are the laws of thought ? — in one word, what was 
true or not true in everything then generally held to be true ? 

We are far from wishing it to be understood that all these ques- 
tions were immediately suggested or started; but the book-men (as 
their sphere of thought became more and more enlarged) by the 
sharp contradiction of one another, found it necessary to suggest and 
discuss them all. They did so boldly and conscientiously, in their 
contestations. They did so, though many among them were, for the 
anti-Christian opinions they advanced, condemned as heretics. 

But we are too hasty. We must endeavor to show the different 
steps of this evolution, and the main instrumentality of the book-men 
and the theorists in every advance that was made. 

In the course of the reign of Charlemagne, the doctors of philos- 
ophy composed a calendar, and proposed the months as we have them 
now. This calendar they formed by means of their studies of such 
ancient writings of the Greeks and Romans as they had been able to 
procure. 

They prevailed upon Charlemagne to establish this calendar by 
law. By doing this, Charlemagne got all the credit of the work itself ; 
but to a certainty he was incapable of performing it. Individually, 
he was an ignorant man ; but he thirsted for knowledge, glory, and 
power ; had heard from the scholars of the ancient grandeur, monu- 
ments, and literature of Rome and Greece ; and his ambition impelled 
him to carry into effect any suggestion of measures likely to contribute 
to his glory. He was devout, and sought also the glory of God. 
Hence he encouraged education, for he found it furnished men capable 
of serving him effectually in all his aspirations. But who could give 
education % None but the clerks or book-men, who were then the 
only men of science. 

Passing beyond this reign, we see the effects of this policy gradu- 



THE BOOK-MEN. 293 

ally developing themselves. During the tenth century, the arithmet- 
ical figures we now use to write down numbers were first introduced 
into Europe. Previously the Roman letters I, V, X, L, C, etc., had 
been employed to express numeric quantities. The advantage of the 
new method we can all appreciate, for it is the method we all use at 
present. But who first introduced and taught this improvement in 
arithmetical notation with all the facilities it affords for the calcula- 
tions ? We owe the importation to the book-men who travelled to 
acquire knowledge from the Arabs who had conquered Spain, and 
whose schools at Cordova had acquired great celebrity. Thus we see 
the advance of science was from one set of book-men to another set 
of book-men, and from their schools to the people. 

In this and the preceding century too, we find that it had become 
a common practice for the doctors of philosophy and theology to 
challenge each other to public debates ; and that it became fashion- 
able for the gentry to be present at these intellectual duels, where 
thought met thought in a struggle to convince of truths or convict of 
error. 

From theologians arose the most distinguished philosophers of the 
times. We could, in our advanced state of knowledge, consider the 
scientific opinions they advanced as unworthy of our serious considera- 
tion ; but then they were of the utmost importance, in this, that they 
were incitements to thought and to further investigation. This was 
the main thing in an age of intellectual obscurity, to bring forth 
more and more light from the first sparks of truth. The mind once 
awakened, curiosity and reflection once aroused, a process of develop- 
ment of right reason was inaugurated, which in time spread itself 
from the mind of man over all nature. 

This takes place in the midst of the first Crusades, by which hun- 
dreds of thousands were led to perish disastrously ; but restless and 
curious philosophers followed in the wake of war and rapine, and 
hovered around the armies to bring back from the East all the science 
they could gather. We often read of the improvement in science the 
West of Europe derived from the Crusades ; but the story is always 
told so as to leave the impression that the plunder the mind brought 
back from Constantinople, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria, was 
gathered there by the boorish soldiers and their captains. A moment's 
thought will, however, set us right on this point. Science could only 
be gathered by men already partially acquainted with science, by men 
having a taste for it, by the scholars and the book-men. To them, 
therefore, must we award all the praise for any scientific advantage 
which Europe derived from the Crusades. The armies were intent 
upon booty and power; the philosophers who followed them were 



294 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

seeking for new truths ; and the advance of knowledge that they re- 
turned with is one of the benefits the West of Europe derived from 
the Crusades. 

Let us note some of the most important prizes they carried home. 
At Amalfi, a port in the southern part of Italy, a stopping-place for 
the Crusaders, they discovered a copy of the Institutes and Pandects 
of Roman Law, a work which had been long lost to the world. From 
the Arabians of Spain or Alexandria they procured the works of Plato 
and Aristotle, as well as other learned treatises of ancient sages. These 
they studied and commented on with assiduity, each one according to 
the bent of his mind. Hence, in time we find the learned men not 
only becoming numerous, but divided into classes. Some follow the 
study of religion, humanity, and mind ; others devote themselves to 
history, grammar, and poetry ; others to law ; others to mathematics 
and astronomy, and others to architecture. But we must keep in view 
that all these sciences and arts were yet in a crude state, far, far 
beneath what they are at this day. The book-men, the theorists, the 
philosophers, had centuries of research, discussion, and reflection to 
accomplish, and numberless labors to undergo, before producing the 
good harvest we are now enjoying. 

Thus, in the thirteenth century the book-men and their disciples, 
the lawyers, politicians, poets, painters, masons, astronomers, architects, 
navigators, physicians, and all other seekers and distributors of knowl- 
edge, had hosts of adherents among the masses. Hence the practical 
results of the labors of the scholars were becoming more apparent. 

In religion, St. Thomas produces his Svm of Theology, and brings 
the scholastic philosophy to its perfection. In politics, the yeomanry 
of England, instigated by Archbishop Langton, a book-man, demand 
and obtain Magna Charta — that is to say, no taxes without repre- 
sentation, trial by jury, habeas corpus, and no taxes without the con- 
sent of Parliament — while in Florence a democratic constitution is 
established by the people. In science, the labors of the alchemists 
and astrologers are progressing toward the first positive dawn of 
chemistry and astronomy ; and Roger Bacon, the first of the great 
pr< >phets of natural science, reveals some of the most important secrets 
of chemistry. Roger Bacon, the first of the natural philosophers, who 
was he ? History answers — a book-man, a monk, a solitary student of 
the works of his predecessors in philosophy and theology. In the arts, 
Gothic architecture raises a worthy tribute to Heaven. We also find 
that in this century navigation begins to improve and commerce to be 
developed, particularly in England and in Italy ; and the learned take 
advantage of the facilities thus afforded to undertake voyages in search 
of geographical and other knowledge. Among the rest, Marco Polo, 



TEE BOOK-MEN. 295 

a student of languages, travels throughout Asia, finds his way even to 
China and Japan (a most wonderful feat in those days), and, on his 
return, writes an account of his travels ; and his book, at a later day, 
serves (among other things) to induce the discovery of America by 
Columbus. 

We now enter the fourteenth century, and amid the many practical 
consequences of the dissemination of knowledge from its original 
source, the book-men and philosophers, we might, unless we consider 
the necessity of the case, lose sight of the starting-point. In Spain, 
Alfonso the "Wise gives his people the laws of the Seven Partides, 
compiled by philosophical jurisconsults from the Roman law. In 
France, the States-General, or Grand Parliament, is convoked by 
Philip le Bel, and, after him, Louis X. makes the Parliament a per- 
manent institution for the sanction of all laws. By and by the serfs 
and peasantry acquire their freedom and gain many valuable rights — 
not, however, without insurrection and bloodshed. Marcel in Paris 
and the Jacquerie in the provinces strike for liberty. In England, the 
Commons assert their privileges : no money to government without 
their consent ; the concurrence of the Commons with the Lords neces- 
sary for all laws ; and the right of inquiry and impeachment by the 
Commons established. In Switzerland, William Tell leads his coun- 
trymen to victory and national independence and republican institu- 
tions. In Italy, the mariner's compass is invented by Gioja de Amalfi. 
Dante, Boccaccio, and Petrarch, those first lights of the dawn of polite 
literature, compose their beautiful romances and poems. In Germany, 
clocks are invented, and Schwartz first puts gunpowder, invented by 
Roger Bacon, to practical use, and some scientific mechanic builds the 
first paper-mill. Previously manuscripts were all written on parch- 
ment. These were magnificent results, taking place in the midst of 
terrible persecution ; but we understand it all when we know that in 
spite of every obstacle and opposition the book-men had, in this and 
the preceding centuries, unceasingly labored, amid the capricious favors 
and disfavors of princes and kings, to establish libraries, schools, and 
universities everywhere. They succeeded admirably, and every gen- 
eration saw the increase of the number of those to whom the benefits 
of education had been communicated. Notwithstanding the fears of 
despots, the trial by ordeal began to fall into disrepute, the influence 
of the principles of the laws of ancient Rome as Christianized by Jus- 
tinian was felt. 

At last we reach the glorious fifteenth century, ever memorable for 
the invention of printing and the discovery of America. Why was 
printing invented '. Because the demand for books had directed inven- 
tive genius to seek a substitute for the laborious and costly process 



2 ^55^ YS—3IIXED. 

of copying. Gutenberg, the inventor, was himself a lover of books 
and a scientific mechanic. Why was America discovered ? Because 
schools of mathematics, astronomy, and navigation had been estab- 
lished at Genoa, in one of which Columbus was educated. Thence, 
and in subsequent life, he derived the benefits of the labors of Lorenzo 
of Pisa, who had introduced algebra into the universities of Europe ; 
and of Miiller and Boehm, who had, by their geometrical researches 
and theories, demonstrated the rotundity of the earth. With this 
knowledge, confirmed by observation during his early life as a navi- 
gator, and the works of Marco Polo, Columbus projected the voyage 
which resulted in the discovery of the Western Continent. But print- 
ing and the rotundity of the earth were not the only consequences of 
the studies of book-men in the fifteenth century. We have already 
mentioned algebra, and have time only to state that the establishment 
of the first bank at Genoa, the Hanseatic League, the voyage of Vasco 
de Gama around the Cape of Good Hope, the first working of coal- 
mines at Newcastle, Norwich, the first drama, the final systematization 
of musical notation, all took place in the fifteenth century. We should 
also have shown how the study of aesthetical principles in this and 
the preceding century, by the societies and guilds of masons and 
architects, endowed the world with great painters and architects 
and sculptors — Benvenuto, Baphael, Angelo, Titian, and many more 
who have left behind them imperishable monuments of their studies 
and genius. 

Need we look back to recapitulate and confirm the fact that the 
highest source, continuous movers, and central custodians of the studies 
which caused these great events were book-men, school-men, and the- 
ologists ? Let us rather look forward into succeeding centuries, and 
merely mention the names of Erasmus, Thomas More, Francis Bacon, 
Descartes, Tycho Brahe, Kepler, Galileo, Newton, Dalton, Lavoisier, 
Shakespeare, Harvey. But no ! the names of the studious thinkers 
who from their cabinets and laboratories have revolutionized the 
world, and to whom we owe the grand and beautiful civilization and 
works — arts, machines, products, conveniences, political science, lib- 
erty, commerce, etc. — which we now enjoy, would take hours to enu- 
merate. There is not a development of science or art that cannot be 
traced back to the "eureka " of some solitary, plodding book-man. 

Popular Science Monthly. 1882. 



DUELLING, 



BY ETIENNE MAZUKEAF. 



[Etienne Mazureau, born in Roehelle, France, in 1777; died in New Orleans,. 
May 25, 1849. Vide p. 55.] 

Does reason justify it ? We see two bipeds in human shape 
stationed opposite to each other, armed with swords, guns, or pistols. 
Yesterday they Avere at peace with each other, and with all the world. 
To-day a prejudice, as ridiculous as it is inhuman, has brought them 
into mortal conflict. Thev wish to take each other's lives ! A single 
word of common sense would reconcile them ; they are deaf to its 
voice — they must have blood ! 

Turn away your eyes, and fix them upon two dogs who are hun- 
grily watching a bone which a butcher has cast before them. With 
bristled hair and flashing eyes and open mouth, they threaten to tear 
each other to pieces. At a signal given by the witnesses of the bipeds, 
as at the first instinctive movement of one or other of the dogs, the 
battle begins, and is only ended when the ground is stained with their 
blood. 

Will you tell us Avhether it is the dog who is elevated to an equality 
with the man, or is it the man who has degraded himself to a level 
with the dog ? 

What does the duel prove ? Two men are suddenly engaged in a 
quarrel. Their passions are inflamed ; one insults the other by calling 
him a coward or a scoundrel. The man who has been insulted sends 
the other a challenge, which is accepted. They meet and fight, and 
the offender triumphs ! Does it result from this that the victim of a 
false point of honor is either a scoundrel or a coward ? 

Two individuals are engaged in political discussion. One of them 
advances a true proposition, which wounds the other's feelings. It is 
followed by his giving him the lie. From this results a duel, in which 
the one who gave the lie kills his adversary. Does this prove that 
the man who was killed did not speak the truth ? 

Is the duellist a patriot \ To the duellist, a few minutes of what is 
called courage suffices. The true soldier, who is ready to give his life 
to his country, must have constant and unwavering fortitude. With 
a very few exceptions, the professional duellist is as bad a soldier as 
citizen. 



298 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

Formerly the party who was insulted had the choice of weapons. 
Nowadays a monster, steeped in blood, insults the man who has 
offended him, or rather the man who he imagines has insulted him, 
with the hope that he will demand satisfaction of him. He is fully 
prepared. On receiving the challenge, he answers that he is ready, 
and will be happy to send a bullet through the brains of his adver- 
sary. 

Thus the offender, in insulting his enemy, whom he knows to be 
inferior in skill or physical force, virtually says to him, " Swallow this 
insult, or I will kill you ; I have abused you, and I wish to take your 
life. I constitute myself the judge in settling this difference between 
us. I have condemned you, and I wish to be your executioner." 

Does the refusal of a challenge confer disgrace? Mirabeau and 
the Marquis du Chatelet were both members of the Constituent Assem- 
bly of France, and leaders of opposite parties. It happened that Mira- 
beau used some expressions in debate which the Marquis was pleased 
to consider as somewhat offensive, and sent him a challenge. Mira- 
beau replied to him in the following words : 

Monsieur le Marquis : 

It would be very unfair for a man of sense like me to be killed by a fool like 
you. 

I have the houor to be, with the highest consideration, etc., 

Mirabeau. 



THE JUDICIAKY.* 

BY FEANgOIS-XAVIER MARTIN. 

[Francois-Xavier Martin was bom in Marseilles. France, March 17, 1762. At the 
age of eighteen he emigrated to Martinique ; but little is known of his career in that 
island. Landing in the United States in 1786, he took up his residence in Newbern, 
N. C. There he was engaged for many years in the printer's trade. During this period, 
also, he had been admitted at the age of twenty-seven to the bar of the State. He 
translated and compiled many useful law-works, and wrote a History of North Carolina. 
In 1S06-7 he served as a member of the State Legislature. In 1809 President Madison 
appointed him Judge of the Territory of Mississippi ; but the following year he was 
transferred to the bench of the Superior City Court of the Territory of Orleans. In 
Louisiana he afterwards filled successively the offices of Attorney-General, Associate 
Justice of the Supreme Court, and Chief-Justice of the Supreme Court ; and in 1845 
he retired to private life. His History of Louisiana (1827) exhibits, in a marked degree, 
the legal quality of his mind : it is clear, logical, and critical, but, in the main, barren 
of ornament. During the latter years of his life he was blind. He died December 10, 
1846.] 

It is the duty of history to record the virtues and errors of con- 
spicuous individuals. In free governments, precedents are to be 
dreaded from good and popular characters only. Men of a different 
cast can never obtain sufficient sanction for their measures to make 
their acts an example for others. Hence the necessity of exposing the 
false grounds of the actions of the former, and pointing out the evil 
consequences to which they lead. 

The history of every age and every country shows that the higher 
man is placed in authority, the greater his necessity of bridling his 
passions ; lest others should believe that anger and resentment have 
prompted measures which should have had no other motive but public 
utility, and that a temper which can bear no contradiction, and a 
will spurning all control, are the characteristics of a man in power. 
It teaches us how important it is he should not select for his advisers 
men who have enlisted themselves in the ranks of those who oppose 
the measures of government — men having private interests to subserve, 
private enemies to gratify, and private injuries to avenge ; that he 
should abstain from acting personally in cases which present great 
latitude for the improper indulgence of his feelings, and leave to dis- 
passionate tribunals the punishment of those who have wounded his 
pride by setting his authority at defiance ; refraining to become the 

* [History of Louisiana.] 



300 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

prosecutor and arbiter of his own grievances and to place himself in a 
situation in which, reason having but little control, he may do great 
injustice ; and suspicion always, and censure often, attaches to his 
determination. 

May the citizens of these States ever find, in the annals of their 
country, reasons to cherish and venerate that branch of government, 
without the protection of which it is in vain that the invader is re- 
pelled ; the benign influence of which man feels before he enters the 
portals of life ; which guards the rights of the unborn child,, throws 
its broad shield over helpless infancy ; the solicitude of which watches 
over man's interests whenever disease or absence prevents his attention 
to them ; to which the woodsman commits his humble roof and its 
inmates, in the morning when, shouldering his axe, he whistles his 
way to the forest, assured it will guard them from injury, and secure 
to him the produce of his labor ; from which the poor and the rich are 
sure of equal justice ; which neither the ardor civiumprava juhentnim, 
nor the vulf'/s instaiitis t;/ranni, will prevent from coming to the relief 
of the oppressed ; which secures the enjoyment of every domestic, 
social, and political right, and does not abandon man after he has 
passed the gates of death — leaving him in the grave the consoling 
hope that the judiciary power of his country will cause him to hover 
awhile, like a beneficent shade, over the family he reared, directing 
the disposition of the funds his care accumulated for their support, 
and thus, by a sort of magic, allow him to continue to have a will 
after he has ceased to have an existence. 



THE MODEL JUDGE. 



BY GUSTAVUS SCHMIDT. 



[Gustayus Schmidt was born in Stockholm, Sweden, of a distinguished family, in 
1793. Being of an adventurous disposition, he left home, and went to New Orleans, 
where he applied himself to the study and practice of law. He soon gained high rank 
at a bar of exceptional excellence. His briefs were models of legal precision, marked by 
a style which, while not ornate, abounded in scholarly touches. He died, while on a 
trip to Virginia, September 21, 1877.] 

Few names are to be met with in the judicial annals of any country, 
entitled to greater respect than that of John Marshall, the late vener- 
able Chief Justice of the United States ; and there are few lives, which, 
like his, present such an harmonious assemblage of the best and noblest 
qualities which adorn public as well as private life. 

A biography of this distinguished individual would be an impor- 
tant and instructive acquisition to our literature ; and it is to be hoped, 
that among the many talented men of his native State, several of whom 
have had the very best opportunities of appreciating his worth, some 
one will be found disposed to discharge this debt, which is due to his 
memory, and which is also due to Virginia and to the United States, 
as the heirs of his fame, and as participators of the lustre which his 
talents and his virtues have imparted to the land which gave him 
birth. 

That this task will some day be ably accomplished, we cannot for 
a moment doubt ; and in the meantime we shall attempt to arrange 
such reminiscences of his life and character as we have treasured up 
during a residence of about eight years in the city of Richmond, 
where we had frequent opportunities of seeing him both in public and 
private life. 

John Marshall was a man whom no one could approach, while in 
the discharge of his official duties, without feeling respect, and whom 
no one ever knew intimately without being inspired with love and 
reverence for his character. 

AYhen we first saw Judge Marshall he was in the zenith of his 
fame, and, though advanced in years, in the full enjoyment of his phys- 
ical as well as intellectual faculties. We had already acquired suffi- 
cient experience of the world to be aware that reputation, like remote 
objects, often derives its enchantment from the distance, and that 



303 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

many an individual whose name has been trumpeted far and wide by 
renown, and whom our imagination has invested with the attributes 
of a demi-god, frequently dwindles into a very ordinary mortal upon 
closer inspection ; and yet we were not disappointed. 

There was an expression of benevolence, dignity, and reflection in 
the appearance of Mr. Marshall, calculated to make a highly favorable 
impression on every one who saw him ; but few persons would be apt 
to divine, at first glance, that under this calm and sedate exterior 
dwelt a mind, which, for depth of thought, reach of comprehension, 
and power of analyzing and of reducing the most complex questions 
to their simplest expression, had scarcely an equal. And, indeed, the 
great superiority of his mind consisted rather in the harmonious 
development of the perceptive and reflective faculties, than in any 
undue or remarkable preponderance of any one intellectual quality. 

The extent of Mr. Marshall's legal attainments is sufficiently 
attested by his decisions while Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of 
the Union, among which there are many which, on account of the 
familiar acquaintance they display with the principles of international, 
public, and common law, and the perspicuity and elegance of their 
style, as well as the convincing force of the reasoning, must be viewed 
as models of judicial eloquence. And yet he can hardly be regarded as 
a learned lawyer, in the sense in which this word is often employed ; 
as his acquaintance with the Roman jurisprudence, as well as with the 
laws of foreign countries, was not very extensive. He was what is 
called a common-1 a in lawyer, in the best and noblest acceptation of the 
term. He was educated for the bar at a period when digests, abridg- 
ments, and all the numerous facilities which now smooth the path of 
the law student, were almost unknown, and when you often sought in 
vain in the Reporters, which usually wore the imposing form of folios, 
even for an index of the decisions, and when marginal notes of the 
points determined in a cause was a luxury not to be either looked for 
or expected. At this period, when the principles of the common law 
had to be studied in the black-letter pages of Coke upon Littleton, a 
work equally remarkable for quaintness of expression, profundity of 
research, and the absence of all method in the arrangement of its very 
valuable materials ; when the rules of pleading had to be looked for in 
Chief Justice Saunders's Reports, while the doctrinal parts of a juris- 
prudence, based almost exclusively on precedents, had to be sought 
after in the Reports of Dyer, Plowden, Coke, Popham, Leonard, 
Yelverton, and others — it was then no easy task to become an able 
lawyer, and it required no common share of industry and perseverance 
to amass sufficient knowledge of the law to make even a decent 
appearance in the forum. At this time, when the viginti annorum 



TEE MODEL JUDGE. 



lucvhratwrm were hardly deemed sufficient to make a resnectahl. 
lawyer, lie succeeded, in a commntivplr w+ I . res P ectable 

readiness and acuteness in distinguishing ZtZ^thT- Gget 

both with fte facts 1 t ^w^Mgwrt attention and familiarity 

of the fferent rl, of ° d 1 f, termine ** relative importance 

uie umeient rules ot law applicable to a oiven sptmp* nf fw* i 

much perspicacity and practice to select the^ZSn^St 

thp'fr 1 ' apS ., the , 0nly real dan S er to be apprehended from the study of 
mnl hlicL J ld C1 T S t 0t ' "'i 1 " 1 ^ 1 "* is > that - ~^ the 



304 SSSA YS— MIXED. 

ha nters, than scientific jurists. It is unfortunately much easier to 
rely on the authority of others in forming opinions, than to form 
them for ourselves after laborious investigation ; and it is agreeable 
to the natural carelessness of most men rather to adopt current opin- 
ions, than to elaborate any of their own. 

Judge Marshall's mind was of a very different order, and pos- 
sessed a vigor and rapidity of analysis which was truly remarkable, 
and had the appearance of an intuitive and almost instinctive percep- 
tion of the points on which depended the resolution of the most com- 
plicated questions. Intimately acquainted with the principles of the 
common law, and indeed with the whole range of constitutional and 
public law, no sophistry or argument, how ingeniously soever it might 
have been prepared, and no matter what array of authorities might 
be brought to its support, could mislead his judgment, or induce him 
to give his assent to a proposition which was not intrinsically true. 
He had a rectitude of the heart as well as of the head, which enabled 
him to detect all fallacies of an argument, how skilfully soever they 
were concealed from the eye of an ordinary observer. 

On the bench the Chief Justice was a model of what a judge 
ought to be, and though we have seen many judges while in the dis- 
charge of their functions, both in this and other countries, Ave have 
never met with one who approached so near the beau ideal of a per- 
fect magistrate. 

In ordinary life his conduct was affable and polite ; and when 
entering the court-room, which was usually before the appointed 
hour, for he was extremely punctual in the discharge of his duties, 
his conversation was cheerful, and evinced a remarkable freedom of 
mind, which in men of eminent attainments in any particular science 
is almost an invariable criterion of superiority of intellect. 

In his colloquies on such occasions with the members of the bar, 
which were frequent, no attempt was ever made to claim superiority, 
either on account of his age or his great acquirements ; neither was 
there any effort to acquire popularity ; but his conduct was evidently 
dictated by a benevolent interest in the ordinary affairs of life, and a 
relish for social intercourse. The moment, however, he took his seat 
on the bench, his character assumed a striking change. He still con- 
tinued the same kind and benevolent being as before ; but instead of 
the gay and cheerful expression which distinguished the features while 
engaged in social conversation, his brow assumed a thoughtfulness and 
an air of gravity and reflection, which invested his whole appearance 
with a certain indefinable dignity, which bore, however, not the slight- 
est resemblance to sternness. The impression made on the beholder 
was that of a man engaged in some highly important and grave delib- 



THE MODEL JUDGE. 305 

eration, which he apparently pursued with pleasure, but which at the 
same time seemed to absorb his whole attention, and required the full 
exercise of his faculties. 

During the examination of the evidence, as well as on the argument 
of a cause, he was all attention, and listened to everything that was 
said on both sides with a patience which was truly extraordinarv ; 
and we do not recollect in the course of the six years that we con- 
stantly attended the sessions of the Circuit Court of the United States, 
at Richmond, ever to have seen him indicate impatience even bv a 
gesture. The remarks of Bishop Burnet with regard to Sir Matthew 
Hale apply with equal force to Judge Marshall : " Nothing was more 
admirable in him than his patience. He did not affect the reputation 
of quickness and despatch by a hasty and captious hearing of the 
counsel. He would bear with the meanest, and gave every man his 
full scope, thinking it much better to lose time than patience." We 
remember on some few occasions, at the close of an argument, to have 
heard him address a question to the counsel with a view either to 
ascertain whether there did not exist some legal adjudications in rela- 
tion to the points for which he contended, or to be assured that he 
had correctly understood his propositions ; but always in a manner 
which convinced the person addressed that his sole object was to 
obtain, and not to convey, information. He always acted on the 
principle that a court of justice was a sanctuary, where parties had a 
right to be heard ; that though the law had wisely interposed a special 
class of agents, called lawyers, to protect the interests of suitors, not 
only because they were presumed to be better acquainted with the 
science of the law, but also to prevent the tribunals from becoming 
the arena of disputes, which the passions and interests of the parties 
would not fail to make it, if they were permitted personally to defend 
their suits, yet the advocates of a cause represented their clients and 
were entitled to be heard ; not on account of any merit or privilege 
they possessed as lawyers, but because they acted in behalf of the 
citizens of the community, for whose benefit the administration of 
justice was created, and because the highest and the lowest member 
of society was entitled to equal favor in a court of justice. 

Few judges seem to have so maturely reflected on the duties of a 
judge as Mr. Marshall, and few certainly carried into the practical 
administration of the laws so profound a respect for the rights of the 
citizen as he did. We doubt much, whether a single example can be 
adduced, throughout his long judicial career, of a party or his counsel 
having complained, or of their having had just cause to complain, of 
his not allowing them full latitude for the defence of a cause. Indeed, 
so firmly was his love of justice seated, and so desirous was he to 
20 



306 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

decide correctly and after a full knowledge of all the facts and circum- 
stances of a cause, that he listened with greater attention to the argu- 
ments of young lawyers, if possible, than to those that were more 
experienced. He did this because he seemed to think that the more 
feebly a cause was defended, the more it was necessary that the 
experience of the judge should protect the rights of the suitor, who 
was not justly chargeable with the deficiencies of his advocate ; since 
his means might possibly not have enabled him to procure a more 
skilful one, or he may have thought that since his defender had a 
license to practise the law he must possess sufficient skill for his 
protection. 

He probably also believed that clients are not always competent 
judges of the legal attainments of the members of the bar. Be this as 
it may, it is certain that his love of justice, his desire to adhere to the 
rules of law and to understand the nature of a cause in all its bearings, 
were equally conspicuous, and inspired a respect for his opinions which 
will hardly be believed by those who have not witnessed the effects 
of it. This respect was carried so far that, we believe, for many years 
previous to his death, none of his decisions in the Circuit Court was 
ever appealed from, unless he had himself advised the party cast to 
appeal. It is true that in nearly all important causes he expressed a 
desire that his opinion might be submitted to the revision of the 
Supreme Court, and this advice was always given with a sincere desire 
that it should be followed, although in most instances it was inopera- 
tive, on account of the settled conviction on the part of the suitors 
that it would be nugatory. 

But the confidence of the public in the correctness of the decisions 
of Judge Marshall arose not only from the causes to which we have 
already adverted ; but likewise from a firm belief not only of the sound- 
ness of his judgment, but of his ability and great legal learning, of 
which he had on many occasions given the most satisfactory and con- 
clusive proofs. 

Many persons are still alive, who, acting either as jurors, or at- 
tracted by the trial of some important cause, have listened for days to 
the eloquent discourses of the eminent lawyers who usually attended 
the Circuit Court, without being able to fix their opinions as to the 
decision which ought to be given in the cause, but who, after hearing 
the charge of the judge or his opinion on the merits of the controversy, 
felt the utmost astonishment at the apparent simplicity of the question 
in dispute, and wondered how they could have been so dull as not to 
perceive what now appeared so obvious. 

One of the most remarkable characteristics of Judge Marshall's mind 
was his great facility in analyzing the most complicated questions, and 



THE MODEL JUDGE. 307 

his talent for presenting them to his auditors in a manner at the same 
time perspicuous, elegant, and striking. He usually began by laying 
down some general proposition which could not be controverted, and 
then showed, by deductions equally clear and logical, its influence on 
the decision of the cause. His premises once admitted, the conclusions 
were irresistible ; and then those who were unwilling to yield their 
assent to the conclusions were unable to point out any error in the 
reasoning. The celebrated and eccentric John Randolph is said to 
have declared in Congress on some occasion, that he was sure that 
Chief Justice Marshall had interpreted erroneously a certain question 
of constitutional law, but he defied any gentleman to point out in 
what the error consisted. This declaration, if it be true-, as we have 
no doubt, proves the extraordinary force and cogency of his arguments, 
in which even an open and skilful adversary could detect no flaw. 

It is the happy privilege of master minds to subdue all difficulties, 
and to acquire at once, and by a vigorous effort of the will, a knowl- 
edge which men of less perfect organizations are often unable to 
attain by long and laborious study. Of this fact, Chief Justice Mar- 
shall was a most striking example ; and which, we are sorry to add, 
had in some instances a pernicious influence on many young men of 
promise, who were studying and afterwards practised the law in 
Virginia. He had acquired early in life a reputation for talents and 
acquirements, which had uniformly increased in all the employments 
he had successively occupied. On the floor of the Legislature and of 
Congress ; in the cabinet, as well as when representing his country 
abroad — in every station he was found not only perfectly qualified to 
fulfil the duties imposed on him, but able to shed lustre on the post 
he filled. His sociability and fondness for innocent recreations, which 
rendered him an agreeable and welcome companion in every circle, 
induced many persons to believe that he devoted little or no time to 
study ; and hence it became fashionable among the young men of 
Richmond and elsewhere to affect a contempt for study, and to rely 
exclusively on what they were pleased to call their native genius. 
That they completely misunderstood his character cannot be ques- 
tioned. Endowed by nature with quick conception and uncommon 
energy, he engaged in everything he undertook with an ardor which 
seemed to absorb his faculties for the moment ; but as soon as he had 
accomplished his purpose, the reaction was in proportion to the pre- 
vious tension of his mind ; and he was never more cheerful than when 
he had completed some laborious undertaking, and never more ready 
to engage anew in serious study than when he had just abandoned 
some gay and festive conviviality. 

This organization is not uncommon in men of great intellect, who 



308 USSA YS— MIXED. 

seem to require constant occupation of some kind, and derive relaxation 
from what others would consider as fatiguing. Such minds are like 
the fertile soil of our Mississippi bottoms, which never stands in need 
of repose ; but only requires a judicious rotation of crops to keep it 
forever productive. 

Mr. Marshall, notwithstanding his great ability, was one of the 
most modest and unassuming men that we have ever known. There 
is no doubt that he was perfectly conscious of his worth, for he had 
seen too much of the world, and had been too often brought in con- 
tact with men of acknowledged talents, not to be aware that he also 
was a man of merit ; but the standard of perfection which he strove 
to attain was so elevated that he never for a moment supposed that he 
had approached it near enough to feel the least emotion of pride. lie 
had also a purer and a loftier motive for his conduct ; a motive inde- 
pendent of all earthly considerations, and which gave to the whole 
tenor of his life its harmony and grandeur. He had very early in life 
examined the evidences of the Christian religion, and the result was a 
firm conviction of the truth and authenticity of its doctrines, which 
ever after became the guide of his faith, and the rule which governed 
his conduct. But instead of inspiring him with the austerity which so 
often characterizes the professors of religion, and which usually ren- 
ders them so unamiable in the eyes of men of the world, his faith shed 
a benignant influence over every action of his life. He looked upon 
the world as the most glorious effort of Supreme power and benefi- 
cence, and on his fellow-men as the most wonderful production of 
creation ; and he viewed their foibles, imperfections, and errors with 
indulgence and charity, which he felt were infinitely inferior to what 
even the most perfect being would stand in need of when required 
to render an account of his acts before the Supreme Ruler of the 
Universe. 

It is impossible to conceive, without having been an eye-witness, 
the respect and veneration felt for the Chief Justice in the city of 
Richmond, which was the place of his habitual residence for a great 
number of years. This respect, which was a spontaneous homage paid 
to his virtues and talents, exhibited itself frequently in the most affect- 
ing and flattering forms. Personally known to every man, woman, 
and child throughout the city, and usually mentioned by the familiar 
appellation of "the old Chief" his appearance in the streets, which 
occurred every day, was sure to excite attention. This attention was, 
however, never importunate or offensive, but mingled with the affec- 
tionate regard and reverence which the ancient patriarchs are said to 
have inspired. Passengers never failed to salute him with respect ; 
noisy disputants ceased their clamors on his approach, and the very 



THE MODEL JUDGE. 309 

children stopped their amusements to take a look at the venerable old 
man,, who continued his road apparently unconscious that his presence 
was even heeded. The same, and even more marked attention was 
paid to him on the bench, not only by the bar, but by the public ; and 
when he uttered any opinion, no matter on what subject, there was no 
necessity for commanding silence, which was the instantaneous result 
of an effort on his part to speak, and which was so complete, that a 
stranger, transported to the scene, might have imagined that his audi- 
tors had momentarily been deprived of speech as well as motion. 

Having fulfilled throughout his long and useful life every duty 
both public and private, he departed for another and a better world, 
much too soon for the numerous and affectionate friends whom he left 
to mourn his departure. But the measure of his glory was full. Hav- 
ing nobly discharged every debt which any man could owe his friends, 
his family, and his country, he left a name imperishable in the annals 
of the land which gave him birth, and in whose service he had con- 
stantly employed the lofty faculties with which he was endowed. We 
must believe that the Supreme Being, having no longer any use for 
his ministry on earth, released the imprisoned spirit, and as a reward 
for its toils permitted it to wing its flight to those bright and happy 
regions, for which it had long panted, and where alone it could expect 
to receive an adequate reward. 

Among that brilliant galaxy of stars which adorns the legal firma- 
ment — the Cokes, the Hales, the Mansfields, and the Eldons — none will 
shine with a more resplendent, or purer, or more enduring lustre than 
that of the illustrious John Marshall. 



OUR ILLUSIONS. 

BY WILLIAM H. HOLCOMBE. 

[William Henry Holcombe was born in Lynchburg, Va., May 29, 1825. In youth 
he pursued a scientific course at Washington College, Lexington, Va. ; and in earliest 
manhood he took his M.D. degree from the University of Pennsylvania. His first 
three years of professional life were spent, as the partner of his father, in Madison, Ind. 
Thence he removed to Cincinnati, 0., where he married, and where he became converted 
to Swedenborgianism and to Homoeopathy. Having removed South in 1852, he resided 
in Natchez, Miss., for five years, and in Waterproof, La., for seven years. In 1864 
he settled in New Orleans. In 1869, on the death of two of his children, he wrote 
Our Children in Heaven, which a great critic has characterized as "a work of genius, 
sanctified by sorrow." In 1875 he was elected President of the American Institute of 
Homoeopathy, and in 1878 chairman of the Homoeopathic Yellow Fever Commission. 
In 1853 he published The Scientific Basis of Homoeopathy ; in 18G0, Essays on the Spirit- 
ual Philosophy of African Slavery ; in 1861, Poems; in 1870, The Sexes Here and 
JI< n after, also In Both Worlds, a romance; in 1871, The Other Life ; in 1872, Southern 
Voices; in 1880, The Lost Truths of Christianity ; in 1881, The End of the World ; in 
1889, The New Life ; and in 1890, Helps to Spiritual Growth. Of his novel, A Mystery 
of New Orleans (1891), Dr. Garth Wilkinson, of London, says : "Dr. Holcombe has 
given us a masterpiece of fiction. This book is an achievement for the English-speaking 
peoples, and sooner or later must go round the world." His latest and posthumous 
work, The Truth about Homoeopathy, is a valuable contribution to professional liter- 
ature. Dr. Holcombe died in New Orleans, November 28, 1893.] 

Thor, the Scandinavian hero, once had three tasks assigned him, 
which, glorying in his strength, he regarded with contempt. He was 
to drain a tankard of water, to wrestle with an old woman, and to 
race with Loke, the runner. He failed in all three. He could not 
drain the tankard, he could not throw the old woman, he could not 
eclipse the racer. " What illusions are these ? " indignantly said Thor. 
The tankard of water was the ocean. Who can exhaust it % The old 
woman was Time. Who can contend with it ? Loke, the runner, was 
Thought. Who can outstrip it ? 

Thus our ancestors, the old Norsemen, taught the great transcen- 
dental truth, almost forgotten by their descendants, that the evidence 
of the senses is not to be trusted, and the profoundest mysteries lie 
concealed under the simplest things. 

We are surrounded by illusions from the cradle to the grave. We 
pass from one dream to another, from one air-castle to another. 

We begin with the illusions of the senses, of which we can never 



OUR ILLUSIONS. 311 

fully divest ourselves until we return to the dust from which we were 
taken. To these are superadded in childhood and youth the illusions 
of the imagination, which may change their forms but not their 
character. In mature life we enter upon the illusions of the under- 
standing, and pass on to our graves hugging to our breasts a bundle 
of opinions and beliefs, not one of which, it may be, can stand the 
crucial tests of truth. Thus we live and die in an atmosphere of sen- 
s< >ry delusions, self-deceptions, false opinions, superstitions, and concrete 
errors, ever accumulating from age to age. 

The fundamental cause of our illusions, which are piled one upon 
another like a tower of Babel aspiring toward heaven, is ignorance — 
ignorance of God, of our own souls, and of our relations to our environ- 
ment — and hence a false interpretation of phenomena. We have lost 
the inner light. We have turned from the Creator, and see only the 
creation. We have fallen from the centre — which is God — down into 
the circumferences and surfaces, where nothing can be seen in its 
true relations, and where we burrow like the mole or creep like the 
serpent. 

The uninstructed senses tell us that the earth is a solid, immovable 
mass, the centre of all things, over which a blue sky, with a panorama 
of creeping sun and stars, is hung in adornment. The truth is that 
our globe, perpetually moving and vibrating in every atom of its 
structure, is revolving upon its axis a thousand miles an hour, whirl- 
ing along upon so enormous an orbit around the sun, and at the same 
time swept away with the sun and the planets with inconceivable 
velocity upon some vaster orbit through the sidereal spaces, in the 
midst of which it floats like a speck of dust upon the ocean. Such is 
a type of the relations which exist between our feeble conceptions and 
the realities of things. 

We look around us, and Ave say that the world is full of sounds and 
colors, which reveal to our senses the Avonderful qualities of the objects 
about us. It is all an illusion, a false appearance. No vibration of 
the atmosphere becomes a sound until it enters the auditory apparatus 
of a living creature. ]STo vibration of the luminous ether becomes a 
c« >lor until it strikes upon the brain of men or animals. The world in 
itself is soundless and colorless. The sounds, the colors, the touch, the 
taste, the smell, the sensation, the life, are all within ourselves. We 
know nothing whatever of the world without us, except from the 
changing states of our own spirit. 

Condillac, the prince of materialists, exclaimed : " Though we 
should soar into the heavens, though we should sink into the abyss, 
we never go out of ourselves ; it is always our own thought that we 
perceive." 



312 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

" The materialist," says Emerson, " secure in the certainty of his 
sensations, mocks at fine-spun theories, at star-gazers and dreamers, 
and believes that his life is solid, that he at least takes nothing for 
granted, but knows where he stands and what he does. Yet how easy 
it is to show him that he also is a phantom walking and working 
among phantoms, and that he need only ask a question or two beyond 
his daily questions to discover that his solid universe grows dim and 
impalpable to his sense." 

We say that the nerves of our body feel pain. It is an illusion. 
Sensation is the consciousness of an impression. ]STerves are conduct- 
ors, but they know nothing of the impressions they conduct : no more 
than the wire knows of the telegraphic message sent through it. Cut 
the nerves, and no pain can be felt in the extremities. Then no pain 
ever was felt in the foot or in the hand. Ah ! you say, it is the brain 
that feels. No ; the nerve centres of the brain have no sensation. 
They may be cut or stuck in any manner without the victim having 
the slightest consciousness of it. Where, then, is the pain ? Not in 
the body at all, but in the spiritual substance which pervades and is 
concealed within the body. 

The outcome of this line of thought is the fact that the body has 
no life, no sensations, no properties of its own. It is merely the spirit 
of man emblematically represented in flesh and blood. It is a piano 
played upon by an invisible performer. It is a chess-board in which 
the complicated game of life is carried on by unseen hands. What is 
true of the body, is equally true of nature and all our external environ- 
ments. They are not created from without, but, as Emerson says, 
they are pushed forward from within ourselves, as the bark and leaves 
are pushed forward from the inner substance of the tree. The 
thoughts of God are externalized in the objects, laws, and phenomena 
of the universe. 

This idealistic interpretation of man and nature is not novel. It 
is venerable with antiquity. It originated in the Garden of Eden, 
when man, without effort, had dominion over all things, and without 
experiment knew the qualities of every object presented to his eye. 
It is the golden key which opens the mysterious depths of the Word 
of God. It pervades all poetry and art like a subtle perfume. It 
irradiates the path of philosophy, from the Oriental sages and Plato 
and the Gnostics, down through Spinoza and Swedenborg and 
Berkeley, to Hegel and Emerson in our own day. It does not pre- 
sent itself as a new claimant for the mental throne of the world, but 
as the original, long unacknowledged, but rightful owner of it. 

It has been recently discovered that this ancient mine of thought 
is full of treasures, which can be utilized in the most extraordinary 



/ 



OUR ILLUSIONS. 313 

manner. It is claimed that the absolute truths which can be drawn 
from this idealistic philosophy are the secret springs which control the 
secret forces of the universe. They can be deployed for the preven- 
tion and cure of disease, for the spiritual renovation of character, for 
the suppression of evil and the evolution of good, and for the intro- 
duction of light, peace, and joy into the hearts and homes of the peo- 
ple. It is religion idealized and vitalized. Instead of being illusory, 
it is the cure for all illusions. These enormous pretensions will be 
scouted by the materialist and skeptic, and long rejected by the eccle- 
siastic and the physician ; but all must eventually surrender to the 
logic of facts accomplished. 

How charming are the illusions of the nursery ! — the miniature 
world in which our larger world is pictured and predicted ! The babe, 
ignorant of self, taking its own image in the glass for another babe ; 
a performance we constantly repeat, for nature is a mirror in which 
we see only ourselves and yet mistake it for something else. The 
ba be, ignorant of space, reaches out its little hand to clutch the moon. 
We, conquerors of space, have touched the moon and the stars and 
the constellations with our eyes, and with that vast artificial eye — 
the telescope — which we have constructed to aid our sight. 

Peep into the nursery and see yourselves, excited and hurried over 
the idle game of life. The little mother solicitous for her suffering 
doll ! The little housekeeper worried over her tin kitchen ! The 
noisy little soldier with his gun and drum ! The little fireman racing 
with his toy engine ! The little lover, looking with dim foreshadow- 
ings of sentiment into his lady's eyes ! Their joys, their sorrows, 
their disappointments, are as keen as ours ; and to superior intelli- 
gences our greatest troubles may seem to have no more real signifi- 
cance than the wail of a child over a lost cake or a broken toy. 

O youth ! happy transition between childhood and manhood, 
enchanting aurora of life ! What soul from whose hearing " the 
horns of Elfland faintly blowing " have not died forever, can forget 
its sweet illusions, its wild ambitions, its incommunicable longings, 
its transports and its tears ? 

"Tears from the depths of some divine despair." 

How readily the little girl clothes herself with illusion as a drapery, 
and experiences the whole range of feminine thought and sentiment, 
from Cinderella in the ashes to Cinderella at the ball ! How the little 
boy gazes with Robinson Crusoe at the footprint of the savage in the 
sand, and trembles with Christian at the sight of the lions in the path ! 
In the dreams, the imaginations, the expectations of youth, what hope, 
what faith, what audacity ! The young statesman declaims to ap- 



314 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

plauding senates which have not yet assembled ; the young poet, 
who has not yet sung, listens to his songs as they echo round the 
world ; the coming soldier keeps step to inaudible drums ; and the 
born sailor boy hears in his mountain solitudes the music of the sea. 

And here it may be supposed that I ought to mention "love's 
vouno- dream 1 ' as the most wonderful and beautiful illusion of all. 
But I cannot do it the supreme injustice to call it by such a name. 
Love is the sole reality in a world of illusions and shadows. First 
born of God, it is itself the breath of heaven. Nor have lovers, or 
poets, or art, or music uttered the whole truth about woman, the 
pearl of innocence, the rose of joy, the light, the life, the wonder of 
the world. 

It is a common opinion among men, that as we advance in life we 
gradually get rid of our illusions. Education, experience, observation, 
and reason are supposed to eliminate errors, to separate the unreal from 
the real, and to establish us at last in the absolute truth. It is all a 
mistake. Education has delivered us in part from the illusions of the 
senses. We learn that what seems the course of the sun across the 
sky is caused by the rotation of the earth. We learn that what seems 
the blue dome above us is not a dome at all, nor is it blue. But 
education upon wrong lines of thought only creates, fosters, and con- 
firms our illusions. Then experience, observation, and reason go 
almost for nothing ; for, having assumed that we are in the possession 
of truth, we construe everything into the support of our position. 
Nothing is more common than to see a man rooted and grounded in 
false persuasions, impervious to a new idea, incapable of progress or 
change of opinion, live in the perpetual illusion that he is free from all 
prejudice, and a candid and liberal investigator of truth. 

No ! our illusions thicken and deepen and strengthen as we grow 
older, and darken the evening of life with innumerable shadows. The 
illusions of egotism and self-conceit, the illusions of pride and family, 
the illusions of wealth and pleasure, the illusions of ambition and 
power, the illusions of belief and opinion, are all strange lights, which 
lead us astray from the true paths, and so confuse our minds with 
their mingled lights and shadows, that at last we know not where we 
are going. 

Illusion is the result of ignorance ; a wrong interpretation of 
phenomena, either natural or spiritual. When the traveller in the 
desert sees the wonderful mirage in the distance, and leaves the beaten 
path in search of its green fields and shining waters, he is lost forever. 
So when human beings construe falsely the problem of life, and start 
out with wrong motives and wrong aspirations in their pursuit of 
happiness, they are soon blinded by illusions from which deliverance 



OUR ILLUSIONS. 315 

is exceedingly difficult. They look upon the wine when it is red and 
showeth its color in the cup, but they cannot see that at the last it 
biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder. They yield to the 
gambling spirit in the illusion of vast and speedy gains, but discern 
not that the end thereof is deep dissatisfaction, poverty, and disgrace. 
They listen to the voice of the siren, but the steps which lead down to 
hell are hidden from their eyes. They rush headlong in the mad 
pursuit of wealth, constantly contemplating with renewed hope the 
supreme satisfaction which its possession will give, until they sudden ly 
hear the voice of God : " Thou fool ! this night shall thy soul be 
required of thee ! " 

It is strange that our illusions should seem to be so real, objective, 
and permanent. The victim of delirium tremens hides from the 
assassin who is in close pursuit of him, or recoils in terror from the 
serpent which is springing upon him. King Richard, starting up 
from his vision of those whom he had murdered, falls upon his knees 
in abject horror : 

" King Richard. Radcliffe! I fear, I fear! 

Radcliffe. Nay, good my lord, be not afraid of shadows! 

King Richard. Now, by the Apostle Paul, shadows to-night 
Have struck more terror to the soul of Richard 
Than could the substance of ten thousand soldiers." 

Just as unreal, just as illusory, as these things, are all the false 
opinions and beliefs, the self-deceptions, superstitions, and concrete 
errors of the human race. 

See the long caravan of pilgrims moving in the shadows of the 
evening of life. What care-worn faces, what wrinkled brows, what 
dejected airs, what weary feet, what aching hearts ! Their little 
schemes of vanity, and conquest, and pleasure, and self-aggrandizement 
have fallen to the ground. Life has been full of wrecked hopes, and 
quenched aspirations, and cruel disappointments. They have lost or 
buried almost everything that was dear to them. If they had known 
the truth, and the truth had made them free indeed, they would 
greatly rejoice ; for they have lost nothing at all, and have buried 
only their illusions. 

The crowning illusion of life is death. This object of terror, which 
casts such a deep shadow upon our souls, is itself a shadow. We 
tremble in the shadow of shadow ! One day, those who love you 
will stand around the tenement of clay you once occupied, and will 
say : " Our friend is dead." From the invisible side you will answer 
back: "It is not so; I am not dead. I have lost nothing. I have 
gained all. Freed from the illusions of time and space, I live forever." 



316 ESS A YS—MIXE D. 

In all this false interpretation of phenomena, this commingling of 
lights and shadows, this confusion of truth and falsity, we are led to 
ask, Is there anything real ? Is there anything genuine, living, un- 
changeable, and eternal ? Is there any fixed centre from which we 
can move, with certainty that the circumferences will not slip from 
our feet or vanish into air ? 

Yes ; the centre of all life is God. The fixed truth from which we 
must reason to all truths is, that the goodness of God, and the wisdom 
of God which flows from and corresponds to it, are infinite, omnipres- 
ent, and eternal. All that is in God, that flows from God, and reveals 
or manifests God, is real and indestructible. All that denies God, or 
counterfeits him, or contradicts and opposes him, is unreal, fantastic, 
and illusory — a mere lie, which has no substance, no reality, but is 
only a statement of something which does not exist. 

So far as the goodness and wisdom of God are in you, to that 
degree are you good and wise ; to that degree are you a child of God, 
an image and likeness of God, a joint heir with Christ, to that degree 
are you real and immortal, and subject to no illusions whatever. The 
treasures of heaven are laid up within you. They cannot be taken 
from you. They do not rust or vanish. They are your own, and sooner 
or later you will realize their possession — ■ 

" For everything which is thine own, 
Flying in air or pent in stone, 
Shall rive the hills and swim the sea, 
And, like thy shadow, follow thee." 

And now we are ready to contemplate one of the greatest and 
most disastrous illusions under which you labor ; one which has the 
strongest hold upon you, and from which you can hardly by the 
greatest effort rid yourselves. This is the illusion : That the self 
which you know and feel, that thinking, reasoning, working, strug- 
gling, worrying personality of yours, is your real self and all that 
there is of you. 

Of course, you say, it is my real self. What else can there be of 
me? 

The prodigal son, when he was in the Yalley of Humiliation, feed- 
ing upon the husks which the swine did eat, thought he was in his 
real selfhood. But the Word says : " When he came to himself, he 
said, I will arise and go to my father." When the Lord cast the 
evil spirits out of the poor maniac on the mountain, he was found 
sitting at the feet of Jesus, " clothed and in his right mind." The 
prodigal passed from the apparent, external self, into the real and 
spiritual self. When the evil spirits were cast out of the maniac, the 



OUR ILLUSIONS. 317 

" right mind," or true spiritual life, which had only been concealed by 
their presence, came to the surface and made itself apparent. 

We are all double. We have an external life of which we are now 
conscious, and an internal life, or true self, of which we seldom know 
anything- here, but of which we will be conscious hereafter. This 
interior life is the kingdom of heaven within us, the life of Christ in 
the soul. It is that which is born of God — the new man. It never 
sinned, it never suffered ; it is immortal. We realize it, or come into a 
consciousness of it, by faith in Christ. Faith is " the evidence of things 
not seen. 1 ' It does not create that interior life ; it simply reveals it to 
us. 

JSTo matter how many evil things yourself or others may say 
against that external self, which seems to be the all of you. It is born 
in sin, conceived in iniquity ; it is sensual, deceitful, devilish. Acknowl- 
edge it all. So it is. Then say boldly : It is not I ; that which you 
speak of is the false, deluded, and illusory part of me, which feeds upon 
husks, hides in the tombs on the mountains of illusion, and wanders 
through the world amid a thousand confused and doleful experiences. 
I repudiate this false self. I lay it down to take up another and 
higher self. When I lose this shadow I shall find the substance. 

The fact is, we are lost children born amid royal splendors, who 
have wandered off from our Father's palace and have forgotten it, 
and have not yet been led into a recognition of our royal rights and 
inheritance. 

When we turn from God, we do not see the Creator but the crea- 
tion. The selfhood then projects before us its immense shadow, in 
which innumerable illusions are engendered. These illusions, in turn, 
beget false interpretations of God, of man, of nature, and of the whole 
problem of life. 

But when we turn our faces toward the Divine sun, the shadow of 
the selfhood with all its brood of phantasms falls behind us, and we 
interpret all things correctly ; for we see them in the light of God. 



AN OFFICER'S DUTIES IN TIME OF WAR.* 

BY P. G,. T. BEAUREGARD. 

[Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard was born in St. Bernard Parish, La., 
May 28, 1818. He died in New Orleans, February 20, 1893. His career, especially as 
a commander of the Confederate Army, is too well known to need repetition. He is 
included among Louisiana's distinguished authors, in virtue of his Commentary on the 
Campaign and Battle of Manassas, and his Summary of the Art of War (1891). Pro- 
fessor Alcee Fortier has characterized the literary style of these works as "mathemati- 
cally precise."] 

When an officer is on active service in the field, everything con- 
nected with the daily life of his men should be an object of constant 
attention ; no detail is beneath him. He must not think the arms and 
ammunition his most important charge, and that if they be in fighting 
order he need not trouble himself much about the rest. 

The arms are the fighting weapons, but the soldier is the machine 
which wields them ; and it is to him — to clothing his back, and feed- 
ing his belly, and looking after his health and comfort — that the great 
attention is due. The arms and ammunition must of course be always 
in perfect order, but they are only required Avhen in contact with an 
enemy. The natural condition of a soldier on service is the line of 
march. He will have at least twenty days of marching to one of 
fighting ; and he has to be preserved in health and comfort during 
those twenty days ; otherwise his musket and pouch would do small 
service on the twenty-first day. 

An officer should go among his men and himself look after their 
comfort. No fear of their losing respect for him because he does so. 
At the end of a march he should never feel at liberty to attend to his 
own wants until he has seen his men engaged in cooking their meals. 
The rapidity with which a regiment has its fires lighted after a 
march, and meals cooked, may be regarded as a test of the attention 
paid by the officers to the comfort of their men. 

Similarly before a march, an officer should take care that none of 
his men leave their encampment or bivouac without as good a meal as 
circumstances permit. 

As regards equipment for the field, an officer must have as few 

*[ Summary of the Art of War: G. P. Putnam's Sons, publishers, New York and 
London.] 



«* p*v 




P. G. T. BEAUREGARD. 



AN OFFICER'S DUTIES IX TIME OF WAR. 319 

wants as possible ; and he should carefully study the art of putting up 
the articles it is necessary he should possess in the smallest possible 
compass. The line of march must be considered as the natural condi- 
tion of a soldier, and everything regulated with that view. 

An officer charged with the arrangement of any military move- 
ment or operation should on no account trust to the intelligence of 
subordinates who are to execute it. He should anticipate and provide 
against every misconception or stupidity it is possible to foresee, and 
give all the minute directions he would think necessary if he knew the 
officer charged with the execution of the operation to be the most 
stupid of mankind. 

No amount of disapprobation of his general's plans can justify an 
officer in canvassing those plans with others, and openly finding fault 
with them. A great many young gentlemen (and old gentlemen, too, 
for that matter) set up for generals, and habitually ridicule the dis- 
positions of their superiors. Such a practice is insubordinate and mis- 
chievous in the highest degree ; the soldiers acquire the habit f roni 
those whose duty it is to set an example ; they lose that confidence in 
their general which is one of the principal elements of success in mili- 
tary operations, and infinite mischief results. 



MAGICIANS AND FEATHER DUSTERS. 

BY JULIA K. (WETHERILL) BAKER. 

[Julia Keim (Wetherill) Baker was born in Woodville, Miss., July 18, 1858. She 
received her education in Philadelphia, Penn. Her husband, Mr. Marion A. Baker, is 
the literary editor of the New Orleans Times Democrat ; and for the past six years she 
has been employed as literary critic and editorial writer on the staff of that journal. 
She is a contributor to LippincoW a Magazine, the Atlantic Monthly, the Century, the 
Critic, et als. ] 

To the eyes of a certain traveller in a tropical land the long lines 
of palm-trees looked like row after row of feather dusters. To 
another they seemed weird magicians, hoary and solemn, grown old, 
immeasurably old, in all mysterious knowledge, and conning their 
strange secrets over as the sun shone upon them and the wind 
passed by. 

In the one simile we mark something smart and not inapt, the 
glibness of superficial observation, and the imperturbability which is 
never afraid to fasten its little price-mark upon anything. Such an 
observer goes upon his journeys of discovery in an express train, and 
gathers material for his notes through the car-window. If any 
shallowness or inaccuracy of comment — any omission of details that 
help to explain the whole — is the result, we must blame the rate 
of speed. It is a fault common enough in our hastening times. As 
regards the other comparison, it is an expression of that imagination 
which has a vision of its own. The inward source of living light 
vivifies the weed, the stone, the wayside pool ; for the aspect of the 
Avorld depends less upon the things seen than upon the one who sees 
them. 

Doubtless the ancient maker of fable and legendary lore was a 
songless poet whose voice the rude age silenced — who could not bend 
resignedly to the thought that there were no miracles or marvels, and 
therefore set to work to create some. It was a rebellion, a pathetic 
revolt, against living in such a prosaic world. If he was never 
entirely successful in persuading himself of the reliability of his own 
inventions, he derived a sort of pleasure from noting the credulity of 
his fellows. It was something, at least, to make others believe. And, 
after ail, his was not so inexcusable a falsification as the rigid moralist 
may suppose. " Who can foretell to-morrow ? " He lived in hope's 
land of promise. 



£g>Bjj 




JUI.1A K. WETHKKII.l. RAKER. 



MAGICIANS AND FEATHER DUSTERS. 321 

His eyes never wearied of watching for the haunting naiad of the 
source. The dragon-fly shimmering with gauzy wings upon the 
brink might be the forerunner of the fairy-folk. When the tree tossed 
its boughs and whispered to the wandering breeze, he started about in 
the eager hope that he might catch a glimpse of the hidden dryad. 
The glitter of green and gold in the fence-corner must be a fay snared 
in the spider's mesh and giving battle with his tiny blade. A sudden 
pattering over the dead leaves of the woodland meant the scurrying 
feet of trolls, hastening away in terrified remembrance of the days 
when Thor was wont to throw his hammer at them. Yonder undu- 
lating line across the pool was not the passing of a water-snake, but a 
kelpie. The sound of piping from the yellowed summer grass might 
be the shrilling of elfin trumpets. That sudden gleam of scarlet 
among the weeds was not the flaunting of some poor wild-flower, 
but the red cap of a fairy messenger on his way to court. 

And as this slave and master of fancy continued to multiply 
marvels about him, all the more devoutly did the simple folk believe. 
Mentally incapable themselves of a like creative energy of imagina- 
tion, it could not occur to them to suspect another of possessing such 
a gift. Thus his supremacy was established, and they came to him 
for intelligence of the unseen world, whose mysteries they strained 
their dull eyes in vain to see. He it was who feigned sleep in the 
magic ring, and ran home breathless at cock-crow, to tell the gaping 
neighbors of the brave things he had beheld. Hiding near the cross- 
roads, upon the stroke of twelve, he spied the fairy procession wend- 
ing along the highway, headed by the queen herself, mounted on a 
snow-white palfrey that moved to the music of golden chimings. He 
heard the wood-sorrel ringing its silver bells to summon the sprites to 
their nightly revels, but not the shriek of the mandrake plucked up by 
the roots — for that meant madness. 

The wandering fires of the will-o'-the-wisps lighted up an unknown 
path he was fain to follow — how vainly, he scarce whispered even to 
his own heart. He parleyed with Robin Goodfellow, and watched the 
flight of witches through the murk of the dead hours. When some 
villager disappeared in the depths of the great gloomy forest and was 
no more seen, the man of the second sight spoke mystic things, as the 
light burned blue, and his listeners huddled around him, shuddering 
between delight and terror, of mortals lured away to the land of 
Faery, changed there to birds or beasts, or wrapped in a magic for- 
getfulness of home and friends. They brought their dreams to him, 
and he unriddled them, being wise in signs, omens, and portents. He 
heard the death-watch tick, and knew to a certainty which way the 
flickering of the corpse-candle pointed. 

21 



322 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

Treading fearlessly the demesne of the graveyard, his only regret 
was that the ghostly occupants did not squeak and gibber at his will. 
He warned his followers that wise men will not stir abroad on Mid- 
summer Night, when " the world goes a-madding," and told them of 
weird rites upon which mortal eyes may not gaze unblasted. "When 
one fell sick and wasted beyond the help of the healing juices ex- 
pressed from herb or flower, he whispered of the casting of spells by 
those in league with evil spirits. If his inventions proved fatal, now 
and then, to some poor mumbling goody, Ave must believe that he 
was never among the active persecutors of wizardly folk. If he 
started the hue and cry, it was in all innocence ; for he loved mysteries 
too well to wish to abolish even the least of them. Sometimes, it is to 
be supposed, he fell a martyr to his magic creed that he scarce believed 
himself. The superstitious feelings he had evoked turned traitor to 
him : his own hand, it may be said, lighted the fagots about his 
funeral pile, and he perished in smoke and flame, for the sake of those 
pathetic imaginings with which he had tried to enliven the dull colors 
of every-day life. 

The German story of the youth who travelled to learn what 
shivering means, might be taken as an allegorical allusion to a certain 
human anxiety to be thrilled. 

The man of second-sight is still among us, and to-day, as ever, he 
finds it hard to reconcile himself to commonplace conditions. But 
modern thought has somewhat clipped his wings ; his flights never 
range so far or wildly as of old. Though he has not relinquished the 
secret hope that each day may bring forth a miracle, he has grown 
wise enough not to confess it. Taught wariness by the mockery of 
practical people, if one finds him hunting for elves in the grass he 
avers that he is pursuing the study of botany. To him a telescope is 
only an excuse for reading his fortune in the stars. He learns the 
jargon of the market-place, and speaks it as glibly as the best. But 
there is always something which betrays him. He has a trick of 
forgetting his surroundings until some ruder jostling than usual 
startles him awake, and he stands all adaze, with the tattered fila- 
ments of the dream still hanging about him. 

Out of the ruins of old beliefs he has striven to build himself a 
cloudy city of refuge, whither he may flee when the outside toil and 
strain become too harsh. The child part of his nature has not died. 
Vain is the effort to console him with the "fairy-tales of science." 
"What he wants is the unexplainable, the unprovable, the legends that 
taught him of a kingdom where love and youth and beauty are 
immortal. Is it lost forever, that wonderland to which he sometimes 
gropes his way back through dreams ? He seems to hear the myriad 



MAGICIANS AND FEATHER DUSTERS. 323 

murmurs of an invisible host attendant upon his steps. The sounds 
of the pulsing darkness, the sigh of reeds by the stream, the cry of 
tides that come and go, the viewless wind — that bodiless voice of rage 
and wild laughter and infinite grieving — all speak to him as of yore, 
but the clew to their signification has been snapped off short. What 
means that shudder before the mystery of infinite beauty ? — and what 
the sudden leap in the heart, as of some captive thing straining at the 
leash ? 

Though the dreamer's philosophy bears about the same relation to 
the sober business of existence as astrology to astronomy, and orni- 
thomancy to ornithology, and he is not an active helper forward of 
progress, he has his uses. However light his weight may be, it is 
needed to preserve the balance of power. His influence prevents the 
world from becoming hopelessly ugly and brutal and matter-of-fact. 
His year is full of days that may not be forgotten, marked in memory 
by the dawn-bright blush of April peach boughs, or the long lights 
wavering across fields of ripened wheat. The pageant of the seasons 
is his: autumn's fire-dropping torch, the ghostly silence of winter, 
summer revels that die in a dazzle of rose and gold, or peaceful even- 
ings of the springtime, when twilight steals pensively over the dew- 
wet sward, and one great, bright star points the hour midway between 
the zenith and the horizon. 

If we take him from his green fields to the clamorous town, he is 
no whit poorer. In the foundry fires he hears the chant of singing 
flame. He notes how the glow of the setting sun transmutes the vol- 
umes of smoke that roll from the furnace chimneys into a hundred 
metallic tints and lustres. He sees something more than bricks aud 
mortar. And when the night is full of echoing footsteps, and the 
vast rumor of life comes to him as to one who stands upon the edge 
of a storm, he feels that the secret of humanity has touched him in 
passing, and something inarticulate strives within him for speech. 

Because he cannot endure that anything should be barren and 
desolate, he is always covering the arid places of the world with the 
blossoms of his fancy, and heaping flowers high upon the graves of 
buried hopes. He can find green grass and fresh water pools even in 
the infinite thirst of the desert, where the sand-column soars above the 
burning plain. If we dispossess him of the earth, he smiles and paints 
the empty sky with the mirage of his dreams. Let those who will 
preach their gloomy creed, that " heaven is a gas, God a force, the 
second world a grave ; " death to him means not dust and dull extinc- 
tion and the conqueror worm, but the flight of an upward- winging 
soul. Like the bird of night, he can " sing darkling." He needs no 
day-spring, for an inward impulse bids the song break forth. Not of 



324 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

his own will, but through some hidden instinct, rises the strain potent 
to " witch the heart out of things evil." It is a wandering voice of 
poesy, giving us back the lost tears and laughter of youth, the thrill 
of dawn, and the immortal pang of love. 

Is it but an idle dream — a vision vain as bright ? What is life, at 
best ? Man, surrounded by terrific forces which may destroy him at 
any moment, plays ignorantly among them like a child, and is some- 
times pleased at fancying himself their master. To-morrow may 
disabuse him of the flattering idea ; but still the valorous pygmy con- 
tinues to rear his puny defences — an ant-hill against an avalanche, a 
cobweb against a whirlwind. Can all his intelligence check the flood 
or stay the tempest ? Can his cunning prevail against the warfare of 
blind and enraged Titans ? When the hour of destruction strikes, his 
utmost wisdom will carry him little farther than the folly of the estray 
from dreamland, who calls those mighty powers giants and sorcerers 
and magicians. 

Lippincott's Magazine. 



QUEEN ANNE FRONTS AND MARY ANNE BACKS. 

BY MARTHA R. FIELD. 

[Martha Reinhard (Smallwood) Field — well known by her pen name of " Catherine 
Cole*' — was born in Lexington, Mo., May 25, 1855. Her marriage to Charles W. Field 
was solemnized in San Francisco, and three years afterwards — upon the death of her 
husband — she removed to New Orleans and secured a position on the Times. In 1881 
she became associated with the Picayune, to which she still contributes. Her "Corre- 
spondence Club " in that journal has enlisted her best energies. She writes ably, brightly, 
and sympathetically upon most subjects that are of interest to her sex,] 

Once upon a time it was my fortune to live across the way from a 
house that had had a Queen Anne front built onto its plain Mary 
Anne back. At that time I was not very familiar with legitimate 
Queen Anne architecture, and I believed the new front on my neigh- 
bors' house to be pure Queen Anne — because the}^ told me so, and they 
had been so informed by their architect. I am the more inclined to 
believe that that front was Queen Anne because, nowadays, any style, 
whether imitated in bedsteads, sideboards, or houses, that cannot be 
otherwise accounted for, is known by the merest tyro — to say nothing 
of toadies — to be Queen Anne. 

For years and years my neighbors had lived, wholesomely, happily, 
and comfortably, in one of those big, bleak, angular, and inartistic 
residences, with a gallery up stairs and down, a hall ditto, a wing in 
which were located the servants" rooms and cooking apartments. 
There was not a room that was not made sacred from its sweet associa- 
tions with the births, deaths, and marriages that are the peaceful prog- 
ress and fate of every family. All the rooms had their gentle ghosts, 
or held, like perfume in an incense bowl, the fragrant memories of 
laughter and of tears. But the girls grew up into young ladyhood, 
the lads were in demand for germans and opera parties, the sturdy 
father prospered in his business, and the upshot of it all was that the 
old house was moved back and aesthetic carpenters soldered on to it a 
gorgeous, gabled, shingled anomaly that for purposes of identification 
was referred to as Queen Anne. The new front was mighty fine. It 
held a library, a suite of drawing-rooms, a reception-room, a music- 
room, a dining-room, a breakfast-room, and a few accessories in the 
way of cloak-rooms and lavatories ; so much, in fact, that it has always 
been a wonder to me why the architect did not also transmogrify and 



326 ESSAYS— MIXED. 

fresco the old original homestead, instead of tacking it on as a con- 
stant, plain, weatherboarded reminder of days that are dead. 

Nothing in New Orleans was finer than that Qneen Anne front, 
and often in the cool of the evening we used to promenade down the 
street just to admire its artistic facade and study in our ignorance its 
intricate curiosities of architecture. But as we walked home again we 
were invariably brought cheek by jowl, as it were, with the plain, old, 
dear and familiar two-story rear building ; and somehow, as the result 
of a joke, we fell into the way of calling it the house with the Queen 
Anne front and the Mary Anne back. 

But it took me a long while to get used to the incongruity. I did 
not find it easy to adjust the Queen Anne with the Mary Anne. As I 
passed from the gabled, aesthetic front to the plain, rain-beaten, 
weather-worn rear building, now joined on to Queen Anne by a sort 
of mediaeval lancet-windowed link, I could not but be reminded of a 
corpse dressed only in front, and who, on resurrection day, will be 
obliged to persistently back against the pearly walls of the new Jeru- 
salem in order to hide its deficiencies of costume, for which, poor 
thing, it is not at all responsible. 

Or else, when I took the street-car and observed that gorgeous 
Queen Anne front bulging so importantly on the grand thoroughfare, 
when I heard people exclaiming over it and admiring it, I could not 
help for the life of me a sensation of discomfort akin to that experi- 
enced by the gentleman who complained that he could not live unless 
the toes of his recently amputated foot were properly straightened out. 
At last the dismembered limb was unearthed, it was found out the toe 
really needed straightening, the member was reburied, and the ex- 
owner had no more trouble. And just so it seemed to me. I never 
could rest easy in the enjoyment of my neighbors' grandeur until that 
Mary Anne back was renovated to a proper accordance with the Queen 
Anne front. 

I think I wasted a great deal of time over this architectural incon- 
gruity before it occurred to me that a more serious fault, and far more 
irremediable, is to be found in people who are permanently afflicted 
with a sort of mental and moral disproportion, that can be explained 
by saying they are closely alike to my neighbors' house with the Queen 
Anne front and the Mary Anne back. 

Who has not been amused to see a swell carriage at the front door 
of a swell residence, while an untidy, broken swill-barrel, a disgrace 
to any neighborhood, stood at the back i 

Who has not seen the mistress in a lace tea-gown lolling on the 
porch of the Queen Anne front, while the slatternly, uncared-for poor 
relation worked in the ashes under the porch of the Mary Anne back I 



QUEEN ANNE FRONTS AND 3IARY ANNE BACKS. 32? 

Who has not seen the high art young ladies in tennis gowns play- 
ing on the lawn before the Queen Anne front, while their ragged 
lingerie flopped on the clothes-line behind the dreary portals of the 
Mary Anne back ? 

Often we haye known the hired society hot-house flowers of the 
florist to come in at the Queen Anne front door, while the unpaid 
maker of ball-dresses, or the hungry beggar for a slice of bread, went 
unrewarded from the gate in the shadow of the Mary Anne rear. 

Who has not heard of the chicken salad and chain] >agne punch 
reception in the Queen Anne drawing-room ? but who hears of the 
conjugal quarrel in the Mary Anne bed-room, or of the corn-beef and 
yellow grits repasts that follow the reception in the Mary Anne 
breakfast-room \ 

I haye heard of a Queen Anne front and Mary Anne back sort of 
a lady whose only tea-gown is reserved for reception days, who only 
uses her nice table-linen when company comes, who even coyers up 
her toilet ornaments on all save her reception days. 

But I have also heard of the Queen Anne front Christian, who does 
all his praying in church ; the Queen Anne front philanthropist, who 
only gives when the gift is certain to be published ; of the Queen Anne 
clergyman, who only has time to be socially intimate with rich parish- 
ioners ; and of the Queen Anne socialist, who publishes a fine equality 
and practises a close exclusiveness, and who snobbishly will have noth- 
ing to do with people who are not rich and fashionable. 

Now and again there is put forth by some sharp publisher a book 
of the biographies of persons of the Queen Anne front and Mary Anne 
back turn of mind. Each individual writes his own sketch, anony- 
mously, of course, or if he does not he gets some friend or relative to 
do the slavering for him. The result is a series of remarkable super- 
latives of adulation. Not long since a lady who writes exhibited to 
me a gushing biographical sketch of herself, cut from a magazine and 
pasted in her scrap-book, but which, unfortunately, I knew she had 
written herself. 

Who has not heard of that jovial, beneficent employer who talks 
of his employees as his " people," who loves them so dearly in public, 
but has it in for them for every small fault they commit, and is cer- 
tain, in the end, in a sly, subtle way, to get even with them ; who sets 
a spy over them, and never forgives them if surprised into any mani- 
festation of individuality or any expression of independence ? 

I have known a preacher to talk beautifully of the great, loving 
heart that should make a man Christ-like, and I have known the same 
preacher to shut the door on a foolish, friendless girl gone wrong. I 
have known a philanthropist to spend six weeks getting other people 



328 ESSA YS— MIXED. 

to give money to a charity concern, yet send a little child asking bread 
empty-handed from his gate. I have seen a missionary to the South 
Sea islanders draw her petticoats away from the clean, guinea-blue 
gown of an old mammy, hobbling in one of our street-cars. I have 
seen a rich toady, whose carriage was at the daily disposal of her rich 
minister's wife, refuse five cents to an old woman who wanted it to go 
to the poorhouse. 

On to the plain, modest, everyday-looking Mary Anne structures 
of daily life, how many people are there who build Queen Anne fronts 
of stucco and Swiss shingles in which to house sham fashion, sham 
elegance, sham tastes, sham philanthropies, sham virtues, and sham 
enterprises. 

Of these the foremost are the people who scrimp, save, and con- 
trive to get away for the summer, not into the woods, nor on the 
sands where the salt waters are, but away, anywhere, to some fashion- 
able hotel, full of the two types of societ}^, the truly fashionable and 
the rich, and the people who wish to be thought truly fashionable 
and rich. The old grinding life at home, lived patiently for the sake 
of this annual outing, is forgotten ; they are now in occupancy of the 
Queen Anne front. All is dark and lights are out in that Mary Anne 
back where the ball-dresses were dyed, the bonnets made over, the 
servants stood off, and the bills disputed. 

Mrs. Tomshoddy, who goes away for the summer, refers to her 
maid, her housegirl, her dining-room servant, and her cook, but for- 
gets to explain that all these are comprised in the one sad little slat- 
tern who sleeps in a closet and really does the work of five. 

Mrs. Iliflyer intimately discusses her friends, the Flats, who share 
expenses with her at home, and no one guesses it is her way of saying 
she takes boarders. 

Now, the only harm in the Queen Anne front and the Mary Anne 
back is that people will laugh at the apparent incongruity, and that 
the owner of this combination is likely to grow ashamed of the plainer 
side. My friends, whose house was the inspiration of this, never, I 
am happy to say, became disloyal to the old roof. The mother in the 
family used to say : " The old house — big, plain, and easy-going— is 
what we were ; the new part — fine, frescoed, and all style and arti- 
ficial manners — is what we are. 1 ' 

In fact, I have known whole cities to live with a view to keeping 
the best foot forward. The front streets were cleaned ; visitors were 
allowed to see only the show places. A great bluster was made of 
enterprise, hospitality, and energy. But when visitors came they had 
to pay double price ; immigrants were systematically crowded out ; 
old grudges were visited on innocent victims; at the first hint of a 



QUEEN ANNE FRONTS AND MARY ANNE BACKS. 329 

hotel, a railroad, a factory, property was run up to absurdly fictitious 
values ; in fact, the cosey, comfortable-appearing Queen Anne front 
was all for show, and an ugly, human conflict still festered in the 
angular halls of the old, half -ruined Mary Anne back, in which the 
town's morals and the town's real character were contained. 

In modern American life everything tends to the facade. It is 
raised high over the rooi — a pretence of factory carving and carpen- 
ter's gluing that a good strong wind can easily blow down. Under 
its shadow may be sickliness, poverty, grimy, dingy rooms. The 
white marble carriage-step does not always announce a clean kitchen. 
The clean-swept sward on the front street does not always mean that 
the alley-way is clear of broken bottles, or that the neighbors in the 
side streets have no cause to complain of every-day untidiness. A 
directoire gown has been known to be draped over a ragged or a 
soiled petticoat. Let us, for truth's sake, be true to ourselves, and when 
we build Queen Anne fronts remove that suspicion of imitation fine- 
ness that is inevitably suggested by the Mary Anne back. 



PART IV. 
FICTION 



THE STOKY OF IZANACHI AND IZANANI. 

BY FRANK MCGLOIN. 

[Frank McGloin was born in Gort, Ireland, February 22, 1846. In his infancy 
he was brought by his mother to New Orleans. In his youth he studied at the public 
schools of New Orleans and at St. Mary's College, Perry County, Mo. During the latter 
part of the Civil War, he served in the Confederate Army. In 1866 he was admitted 
to the Louisiana bar. In 1880 he was elected one of the judges of the Court of Appeals 
of New Orleans, and in 1884 was reelected to the same position. During the seven years 
of its existence, he was editor of the Holy Family, a weekly Catholic journal of New 
Orleans. The best-known results of his labors in the field of light literature are the 
Conquest of Europe, a poem (1874), and the Story of Norodom, King of Cambodia: a 
Romance of the East (1882).] 

The god Izanachi looked down upon the chaos beneath him and 
was grieved. Then he said unto himself : 

" My eyes are weary, and can no longer endure this chaos. There 
shall be a Avorld below, as perfect and well denned as the chaos is 
shapeless and confused, and as beautiful as the wastes below are hid- 
eous." 

. Into his counsels then he brought Izanani, the divine companion, 
and they spoke. 

And lo ! at the command, a world appeared, floating in the gulf. 
And this was perfect in form, as Izanachi had said, and subjected to 
order and law. So beautiful it lay, that ages elapsed before the heav- 
enly ones withdrew their gaze, even for a single moment. 

Then a longing came upon Izanachi. 

" Let us contemplate our work more closely," he said, " and dwell 
for a time among the beauties our word hath summoned into being." 

And again the divine companion was gracious, and the expanse of 
earth was scanned to select a spot most fitting for an abode. Their 
eyes swept plain and mountain, and no land appeared so verdant as 
Japan. The waters were surveyed, and none seemed so placid as those 
of the Inner sea. 

And of all that formed what has since become the Ocean Empire, 
no spot was so attractive as the island of Awaji, clad in rich garments 
of leaves and flowers, and rising from the sea, as though timidly, like 
a virgin from her bath. 

" There let us dwell," said Izanachi, " upon yon isle, that seemeth 



334 FICTION. 

like a basket of verdure and bright flowers, floating upon a violet 
sea." 

Once again the divine companion assented, and together the heav- 
enly spouses descended, sinking slowly through space, until at last they 
stood upon the velvety and blossom-strewn bosom of Awaji. 

They gazed long upon its loveliness, speaking never a word. Then 
again was the yearning in their hearts, and they turned with wistful 
eyes toward each other. 

" Lo," they said, " our celestial abode is not in glory like to this. 
Here let us dwell forevermore." 

Thus it came to pass that Izanachi and Izanani made their home 
upon Awaji, and they dwelt together, during a period, in perfect bliss. 
Children were born and grew tall about them, and each, as it came, 
was a new tie binding the celestial spouses more firmly to their earthly 
abode. The heart of Izanani was replete with the joys of maternity ; 
and Izanachi took pride in the grace and beauty of his daughters, and 
the vigor and symmetry of his sons. 

It happened, however, in time, that a babe was stricken with dan- 
gerous illness. Izanani observed its loss of strength, but comprehended 
not. She was, however, mightily moved and fell to weeping, not 
knowing why she wept. Then she sought her heavenly consort and 
found him not until she entered into the groves; and he too was 
troubled and in grief. 

The child, with time, grew strong again, but the parents were not 
comforted. The joy that had long been theirs was dead ; and they 
spoke not even to each other, so heavily lay this uncomprehended 
woe upon their hearts. Nevertheless, though silent, they were never 
parted ; but, sitting side by side, they pondered deep thoughts, as when 
universes are conceived. Despite all, however, the mystery of their 
sorrow remained inscrutable as ever. 

At length Izanani broke the silence. 

" Tell me, O Izanachi," she said, " why we are thus beset with a 
woe which seemeth without cause ! There has fallen no evil upon us, 
and yet we suffer ! Why should we, who are Gods of Heaven, in 
this be without power or comprehension ? " 

But Izanachi, gazing upon her sadly, gave forth no word, and again 
the silence was long between them. A time went by, and the celes- 
tial ones remained yet hand in hand, until at length, turning toward 
the divine companion, Izanachi spoke : 

" Thought alone," he said, " will not fathom the depths of this sor- 
row. Let us rise, and wandering apart through the meadows and the 
groves, perchance our eyes may see or our ears hear what shall make 
plain the secret which so resists us." 



THE STORY OF IZANACHI AND IZANANI. 335 

Then, the celestial ones arose, and unclasping hands, departed, each 
upon a different way. And they searched the island of Awaji with 
diligence, from shore to shore, and up to the very summits of its high- 
est places. 

As each succeeding night would fall, the heavenly pair would 
come together, and their eyes would meet, full of yearning inquiry ; 
but during many, many days neither spake a word, for their sorrow 
was deep and dumb. 

At length, however, the silence was broken, for as they came 
together one evening in the gathering gloom, in the hand of Izanachi 
lay a butterfly that was dead. 

" Behold," he said, " how motionless ! I found it thus, with wings 
extended, lying among the odorous shrubs that grow upon the hill- 
side. As I drew near it rose not to fly away, but suffered me to place 
a hand upon it. And thus I have borne it hither, watching as I came, 
and yet not a flutter has been upon these golden wings." 

Izanani cast her eyes upon the moth, and her heart was seized with 
pity, but why she knew not. 

And upon the succeeding night it was Izanani who came with out- 
stretched palm, and upon the palm there lay a tiny fish with silvered 
sides. 

" This," she said, " I saw drifting upon the bosom of the streamlet 
that skirts the camphor groves. It floated so as to almost touch the 
bank, and as I stooped it made no effort to escape. Hither have I 
borne it, watching closely, and, like thy butterfly, it made no move- 
ment." 

Another night was falling, and again there was something in the 
hand of Izanani. Now it was a bird of modest plumage. 

" Again was I under the camphor trees, when suddenly this bird 
fell from the branches struggling at my feet. A few great gasps it 
gave, and then others that were more feeble, and at last it lay still as. 
the silvered fish and the golden butterfly." 

Another day was passing, and Izanachi was in the groves. At the 
foot of a great tree he beheld a squirrel, which seemed in deadly fear, 
but yet incapable of flight. And as the god approached it gazed upon 
him, as though with appealing eyes. In the heart of Izanachi was a 
deep compassion, for there came to his mind the suffering babe, whose 
weakness and pain had been the cause of the uncomprehended woe ; 
and he raised the animal tenderly from the earth and placed it in his 
bosom, and sought at once for Izanani. 

" Lo ! " the divine companion exclaimed, " it was even thus with 
the babe." 

And then she placed the squirrel in a bed of softest moss and cared 



336 FICTION. 

for it during many days, as though it had been a child. The creature 
wasted for a period, but with time began to improve, regaining at last 
its strength. 

" Lo ! " Izanani again exclaimed, " it was even thus with our 
babe." 

The animal had been Avon by kindness, so that when its vigor was 
restored it would not depart, but remained, becoming a playmate to 
the children. And the heavenly ones, still in darkness, resumed their 
wandering search. 

It was but a short while before the squirrel again was seized with 
illness, wasting as before. Again the celestial ones cared for it ten- 
derly, as though it had been a child. Their solicitude, however, was 
now profitless, for after some days the creature died. And as it lay 
motionless, the heavenly ones remembered the butterfly, and the fish, 
and the bird. 

And together they hastened to where the butterfly had been laid 
away. It was but dust. And of the fish there remained but the 
bones and the silvered scales ; and of the bird, naught but the sober 
plumage. And the light dawned upon them at last, and sorrow grew 
heavier upon their hearts. 

" This is annihilation," they exclaimed, " and all things that take 
existence upon this beautiful earth must perish. Alas for the chil- 
dren that have been born to us ! " 

And, for certain assurance, they laid away the bod)'" of the squirrel, 
as had been done with the butterfly, and the fish, and the bird ; and 
in time, like them, it, too, wasted and was gone. 

Now was the misery of the celestial couple become grievous be- 
yond even the divine endurance. Every smile that now illumined the 
young and happy faces of their children was a dagger to pierce the 
parents' hearts ; for were these not the doomed who were smiling thus 
sweetly upon them ? 

AVhen Izanani pressed her youngest to her bosom, imagination 
would picture those soft eyes closed, and the sweet and rosy face 
pallid in death. Then would she draw the infant closer to herself and 
moan : 

" Alas, my beautiful ! whom I. must come some day to behold like 
the butterfly and the fish, the bird and the squirrel. Oh, that we 
could either clothe thee with our immortality or else share with thee 
in thy mortality ! " 

And when, for an instant, the heart of Izanachi swelled with 
fatherly pride as he looked upon his robust and handsome sons, or 
upon his beautiful daughters, he would turn quickly away, and sigh 
profoundly. 



THE STORY OF IZANACHI AND IZANANI. 337 

" Alas ! " he would murmur, " it is only for a time." 

Thus, for a period, the celestial ones were sorrowful, until at last, 
Izanani, grieving most for the misery of her heavenly consort, was 
filled with a yearning to comfort him, and then it was she thus spoke 
to Izanachi : 

" Let us no more beget these children of earth, 1 ' she said, " who 
are born but to perish, and whose comings are but the precursors of 
bitter sorrows." 

And so they begat no more children upon the earth ; but, with 
those that had been born to them, they remained until even the 
youngest of them had grown to the fulness of strength and stature. 

Then, thinking still the most of Izanachi's woe, again Izanani 
spoke. 

" Whether soon or late," she said, " some day these stately sons 
and these beautiful daughters must begin one by one to waste and 
perish from us. Then shall there be from each a bitter parting. Let 
us, therefore, withdraw from them now, and bear for once all of 
sorrow which the future has in store, and returning to our heavenly 
mansion, there shall we bring forth an offspring that is not of earth, 
and which shall share with us our immortality. 11 

"But shall we not," Izanachi made answer, "witness from above 
the passing away of this our earthly progeny, and shall not our 
hearts be left behind to suffer \ " 

" True," responded the divine companion, " but shall not our 
heaven-born children recall our hearts from earth, and shall not they 
bring with them a joy that will temper sorrow ? " 

Then Izanachi saw the wisdom of these words ; and the celestial 
ones gathered about them all of the children, sons and daughters, 
that had been born to them upon earth. And when these heard the 
resolution of their divine parents, their hearts were broken with grief ; 
yet not one questioned the justice of the determination. During years 
they wept, and even to this day, the issue of these the sons and 
daughters of Izanachi and Izanani, who have multiplied over the 
earth, are prone to tears, and have sorrowful hearts. 

And sitting in power above, the divine ones have not forgotten 
their earthly progeny, although surrounded by another that is celestial 
and imperishable. The frailer offspring of the earlier time have yet 
their love, and they it is Avho send them the abundant harvest, and 
plenteousness of fish in the waters, and of beasts upon the land. 

And often the divine ones look regretfully upon earth and feel a 
longing for their first-born children, and the showers that fall from 
the heavens are but the tears they shed. 

22 



ESTHER'S CHOICE.* 

BY LAFCADIO HEARN. 

[Lafcadio Hearn was born at Leucadia, Santa Maura, Ionian Islands, June 27, 
1850. He was educated in Great Britain and in France. In 1877 he went to New 
Orleans as correspondent of the Cincinnati Commercial. Liking the climate of New 
Oideans, he remained there, and in a short time became editorially connected with the 
Times-Democrat. His ability as a genre writer and translator was at once recognized, 
and, in Sunday issues of the Times-Democrat, his English versions of French master- 
pieces were a feature for a long while. These were subsequently published in book-form. 
Their success led to an engagement with Harper Bros., which resulted in A Mid- 
Summer's Trip to the West Indies. Among his works are One of Cleopatra's Nights — a 
translation from Theophile Gautier (1882) ; Stray Leaves from Strange Literature (1885) ; 
Gumbo Zhebes ; Little Dictionary of Creole Proverbs (1885); Chita; a Memory of Last 
Island (1890). His style is Oriental in its richness, and his descriptions of Nature are 
among the most beautiful in our language.] 

A story of Rabbi Simon ben Yochai, which is related in the holy Mid/rash Shir- 
Hasirim of the holy Midrashim. . . . Hear, Israel, the Lord our God is ONE ! . . . 

In those days there lived in Sidon, the mighty city, a certain holy 
Israelite possessing much wealth, and having the esteem of all who 
knew him, even among the Gentiles. In all Sidon there was no man 
who had so beautiful a wife ; for the comeliness of her seemed like that 
of Sarah, whose loveliness illumined all the land of Egypt. 

Yet for this rich one there was no happiness : the cry of the nurs- 
ling had never been heard in his home, the sound of a child's voice 
had never made sunshine within his heart. And he heard voices of 
reproach betimes, saying : " Do not the Rabbis teach that if a man 
have lived ten years with his wife and have no issue, then he should 
divorce her, giving her the marriage portion prescribed by law ; for 
he may not have been found worthy to have his race perpetuated by 
her ? " . . . But there were others who spake reproach of the wife, 
believing that her beauty had made her proud, and that her reproach 
was but the punishment of vainglory. 

And at last, one morning, Rabbi Simon ben Yochai was aware 
of two visitors within the ante-chamber of his dwelling, the richest 
merchant of Sidon and his wife, greeting the holy man with /Salem 
tdeikoum ! The Rabbi looked not upon the woman's face, for to gaze 
even upon the heel of a woman is forbidden to holy men ; yet he felt 
the sweetness of her presence pervading all the house like the incense 

* [Stray Lea res from Strange Literature. Copyright, 1884, by James R. Osgood & Co.] 



ESTHER'S CHOICE. 339 

of the flowers woven by the hands of the Angel of Prayer. And the 
Eabbi knew that she was weeping. 

Then the husband arose and spake : " Lo ! it is now more than a 
time of ten years since I was wedded to Esther, I being then twenty 
years of age, and desirous to obey the teaching that he who remainetk 
unmarried after twenty transgresseth daily against God. Esther, thou 
knowest, O Eabbi, was the sweetest maiden in Sidon ; and to me she 
hath ever been a most loving and sweet wife, so that I could find no 
fault with her ; neither is there any guile in her heart. 

" I have since then become a rich Israelite ; the men of Tyre know 
me, and the merchants of Carthage swear by my name. I have many 
ships, bearing me ivory and gold of Ophir and jewels of great worth 
from the East ; I have vases of onyx and cups of emeralds curiously 
wrought, and chariots and horses— even so that no prince hath more 
than I. And this I owe to the blessing of the Holv One— blessed be 
He !— and to Esther, my wife, also, who is a wise and valiant woman, 
and cunning in advising. 

" Yet, O Rabbi, gladly would I have given all my riches that I 
might obtain one son ! that I might be known as a father in Israel. 
The Holy One— blessed be He !— hath not vouchsafed me this thing ; 
so that I have thought me found unworthy to have children by so 
fair and good a woman. I pray thee, therefore, that thou wilt give 
legal enactment to a bill of separation ; for I have resolved to give 
Esther a bill of divorcement, and a goodly marriage portion also, that 
the reproach may so depart from us in the sight of Israel. , ' 

And Rabbi Simon ben Yochai stroked thoughtfully the dim silver 
of his beard. A silence as of the Shechinah fell upon the three. 
Faintly, from afar, came floating to their ears the sea-like murmuring 
of Sidons commerce. . . . Then spake the Rabbi ; and Esther, look- 
ing at him, thought that his eyes smiled, although this holy man 
was never seen to smile with his lips. Yet it may be that his eyes 
smiled, seeing into their hearts: "My son, it would be a scandal in 
Israel to do as thou dost purpose, hastily and without becoming an- 
nouncement ; for men might imagine that Esther had not been a good 
wife, or thou a too exacting husband ! It is not lawful to give cause 
for scorn. Therefore, go to thy home, make ready a goodly feast, and 
invite thither all thy friends and the friends of thy wife, and those 
who were present at thy wedding, and speak to them as a good man 
to good men, and let them understand wherefore thou dost this thing, 
and that in Esther there is no fault. Then return to me on the 
morrow, and Twill grant thee the bill." 

* 



340 FICTION. 

So a great feast was given, and many guests came ; among them, 
all who had attended the wedding of Esther, save, indeed, such as 
Azrael had led away by the hand. There was much good wine ; the 
meats smoked upon platters of gold, and cups of onyx were placed at 
the elbow of each guest. And the husband spake lovingly to his wife 
in the presence of all, saying : " Esther, we have lived together lovingly 
many years; and if we must now separate, thou knowest it is not 
because I do not love thee, but only because it hath not pleased the 
Most Holy to bless us with children. And in token that I love thee 
and wish thee all good, know that I desire thee to take away from my 
house whatever thou desirest, whether it be gold or jewels beyond 
price." 

So the wine went round, and the night passed in mirth and song, 
until the heads of the guests grew strangely heavy, and there came a 
buzzino- in their ears as of innumerable bees, and their beards ceased to 
wag with laughter, and a deep sleep fell upon them. 

Then Esther summoned her handmaids, and said to them : " Behold 
my husband sleeps heavily ! I go to the house of my father ; bear him 
thither also as he sleepeth." 

And awaking in the morning the husband found himself in a strange 
chamber and in a strange house. But the sweetness of a woman's 
presence, and the ivory fingers that caressed his beard, and the soft- 
ness of the knees that pillowed his head, and the glory of the dark 
eyes that looked into his own awakening — these were not strange ; for 
he knew that his head was resting in the lap of Esther. And bewil- 
dered with the grief-born dreams of the night, he cried out, " Woman, 
what hast thou done % " 

Then, sweeter than the voice of doves among the fig-trees, came 
the voice of Esther : " Didst thou not bid me, husband, that I should 
choose and take away from thy house whatsoever I most desired % 
And I have chosen thee, and have brought thee hither to my father's 
home, . . . loving thee more than all else in the world. Wilt thou 
drive me from thee now ? " And he could not see her face for tears 
of love; yet he heard her voice speaking on — speaking the golden 
words of Ruth, which are so old yet so young to the hearts of all that 
love: "Whithersoever thou shalt go, I will also go ; and whithersoever 
thou shalt dwell, I also will dwell. And the Angel of Death only may 
part us ; for thou art all in all to me." . . . 

And in the golden sunlight at the doorway suddenly stood, like a 
statue of Babylonian silver, the grand gray figure of Rabbi Simon 
ben Yochai, lifting his hands in benediction. 



ESTHER'S CHOICE. 341 

" Schmah Israel /—the Lord our God, who is One, bless ye with 
everlasting benediction ! May your hearts be welded by love, as gold 
with gold by the cunning of goldsmiths ! May the Lord, who coupleth 
and setteth the single in families, watch over ye ! The Lord make 
this valiant woman even as Rachel and as Lia, who built up the house 
of Israel ! And ye shall behold your children and your children's 
children in the House of the Lord ! " 

Even so the Lord blessed them ; and Esther became as the fruitful 
vine, and they saw their children's children in Israel. Forasmuch as 
it is written : " He will regard the prayer of the destitute." 



THE MYSTERIOUS GROTTO. 



BY ALBERT DELPIT. 



[Albert Delpit, poet, playwright, and romancist, was born in New Orleans, 
January 30, 1849. He was sent by his father to France to be educated at schools in 
Bordeaux and Paris. He afterwards returned to his native city, remaining there only 
a few months to settle his personal affairs, finally returning to Paris for his life-work. 
His success before literary Paris was almost instantaneous. For so young a man, it was 
remarkable ; for a foreigner, it was without precedent. In 1870 he won the prize 
offered at the Concours Ballande, by his Ltloge de Lamartine ; in 1872 he won the 
Montyon prize, by a book of poems entitled L'Invasion; in 1873 his poem Le Repen- 
tir was crowned. His literary fecundity, always of a high order, showed untiring indus- 
try. From 1873, while competing for the honors of coronation in another field, he 
wrote for the stage. His acted plays, both in prose and vei'se, were Robert Pradel, 
drama (1873) ; Jean nu pied, vaudeville-in-verse (1875) ; Le Message de Scapin, a com- 
edy-in-verse (1876) : Les Chevaliers de la Patrie (1876) ; Le Fils de Coralie (1880) ; 
and Maucroix, a comedy (1883). All of these plays were successes ; but his greatest 
triumphs were secured in the field of romance. His novels include Les Compagnons du 
Roi (1873) ; Le Vengeresse (1874) ; Le Mystere de Bas-Meunier (1876) ; Les Fils de Joie 
and Le Dernier Gentilhomme (1877) ; La Famille Cavalie, 2 vols. (1878) ; Le Mariage 
d'Odette (1880) ; Le Pere de Martial, La Marquise (1882) ; Les Amours Gruelles (1884) ; 
Solange de Croix — Saint Luc (1885) ; Mademoiselle de Bressier, Theresine, and Disparu 
(1888). He died in Paris, January 4, 1893.] 

This is the way I happened to be told the story : 

I was sitting by the seashore, beyond where the lighthouse stands. 
A storm-wind was blowing. The strong sea-breezes, made tepid by 
the sun, came to me impregnated with sharp saline odors. Before me 
the ocean unrolled its waves upon the fine sand, like a green serpent 
prolonging its shining coils in the sun. Behind me was the cliff, with 
its gray fissures, whence jutted out here and there the trunks of sickly 
trees, brambly growths, and meagre furze-plants. Sloping inward, 
almost at the foot of the cliff, yawned a mysterious cavern, a spacious 
grotto, dark and cool. 

I was seized with that unaccountable emotion with which Nature 
inspires those alone with her, when a hand slapped my shoulder, and 
a laughing voice exclaimed : 

" How do you find yourself this morning ? " 

It was the old college-friend I had unexpectedly met the evening 
before — Gabriel F., a naval lieutenant. 

" You must have found your way here by instinct," he continued. 
" Perhaps you never suspected that a tragedy once occurred in this 
very place where we now are ? " 



THE MYSTERIOUS GROTTO. 343 

" A tragedy — here \ " 

" Yes, in that very grotto. It has become famous. The country 
folk call it ' The Love-Chamber. ' I knew of the romance at the very 
time when its characters performed their parts. Light a cigarette, 
and let me tell it you. 1 ' 

" I listen." 



At the time I am telling you about there was a very pretty girl at 
Biarritz, named Pascaline — a Basque about eighteen years of age, tall 
and slight, with that peculiar grace so characteristic of those lithe 
mountain women. Her black hair gleamed under the yellow silk 
kerchief which she always wore fastened about her head in the most 
coquettish style imaginable. Her ruddy lips, slightly sensuous, showed 
at every smile rows of delicate white teeth. Pascaline was a great 
dressmaker, and supported her father, a great big man, half paralyzed, 
who lived in perpetual revery, and rarely spoke except to reply with 
some peculiarly vague Spanish proverb to any question put to him. 
Pascaline adored the old man, and took care of him like a child. So 
folks used always to say, " Pascaline will certainly do well on account 
of the way she takes care of her father." Anyhow, she had a chance 
either way — to do well or badly — for she had two admirers. One was 
Moise Dunez, rich, old, and ugly, who offered her— a fine social 
position. The other was Maxime Sarrabeyrous, poor, young, and 
handsome, who offered her his heart. Maxime was said to be a pro- 
fessional guide in the Pyrenees. He was really a smuggler ; and, as 
was only right, Pascaline loved Maxime — for love always calls for 
love. 



Such was the state of affairs for several months. Moise Dunez 
would often stop at the store and scratch his nose, and gravely 
observe : 

" I can give you a fine social position, Pascaline — a fine social 
position." 

And she would always reply : 

" You are very kind and good, M. Moise, but I love Maxime." 
And old Moise would go off, grumbling to himself : 
" She'll change her mind after awhile ; she'll change her mind." 
But things at last came to such a point that some decision had to 
be made. The two young lovers often took long walks along the 
cliff, and people gossiped about them a great deal. Unfortunately 
they were very poor. A dressmaker cannot save very much, espe- 
cially if she has a father to support, and smugglers have their dull 
seasons. But it is a very fine profession, for all that. Poor as they 



SU FICTION. 

were, however, they loved each other so much that they went to old 
Father Pascal one morning, hand in hand, and said : " We love each 
other, and we want to get married. 11 

The old man shook his head a little and slowly responded : 

" Very well, very well. Semos de los poseos." (Let us be of the 
few.) 

The lovers knelt down before him, and he blessed them. The 
betrothal was accomplished. Pascaline accompanied the youth to the 
usual scene of their promenade, and that evening they remained out 
on the cliffs very, very late. As the young Basque girl was returning 
home full of happiness, with the joy of love swelling in her heart, she 
met Moise Dunez, who observed very gravely, scratching his nose as 
usual : 

" I offer you a fine social position, Pascaline — a fine social position." 

She answered : 

" You are very good and kind, M. Moise ; but Maxime Sarrabey- 
rous and I have arranged everything for the best this evening. 1 ' 

And old Moise went off, muttering as he always did : 

" She'll change her mind after awhile ; she'll change her mind." 



A few days later Maxime was offered a splendid chance to make a 
snug little sum. A whole cargo of goods was to be smuggled into 
Guipuzcoa. The young contrabandista was full of confidence ; but the 
weather was bad. All day and all night a mighty wind was blowing 
from the sea ; and the sailors muttered in fear, " It is Our Lady of 
Guadalupe passing by ! " Our Lady of Guadalupe, the pale Madonna 
with the green eyes, who, when she passeth by, taketh with her in her 
ghostly flight all who are belated upon the vast gray sea. 



" I will return in eight days," said Maxime Sarrabeyrous, as he 
kissed his sweetheart on the mouth. 

But the eight days passed, and then a month — two months — three 
months — went by without any news of the handsome contrabandista. 
Pascaline cried from morning until night. As soon as her work was 
done she would hurry to the cliff, to remain there for long hours at a 
time, with eyes fixed upon the Spanish coast. Ah ! had she only been 
free, how swiftly would she not have departed in search of her be- 
trothed, beyond the mountains towering between her and love ! But 
she could not go ; she must support the aged father. One night a 
cruel rumor came that Maxime had been killed by the custom-house 
officers — the gabelous. And, in fact, a whole year passed without 
further news of him. 

Misfortunes never come singly. One night the little store took 



THE MYSTERIOUS OROTTO. 345 

fire and burned down. No one knew how the thing happened. Pas- 
caline and her father were ruined. Moise Dunez, their neighbor, had 
escaped with his usual good luck. His house was not even scorched. 
But he did not dare to approach the pretty Basque any more, knowing 
she would say to him : " You are very kind, M. Moise, but I shall wait 
for Maxime Sarrabeyrous. He will come back, I am sure. But if he 
should not come back, I shall be faithful to him as though I were his 
widow. And I am a good girl, resolved to make my own living." 
Yes, she was a good, brave girl, poor Pascaline ; especially brave and 
good, considering how unhappy her situation. After her little store 
was burned she could not work for herself any more, but had to work 
for others — much harder than before and for much less money. Now 
the old man had to remain all alone the whole day, and he was visibly 
declining. Two years passed, and still no news of Maxime Sarrabey- 
rous. Finally the misery of the father and daughter became so great 
that M. Dunez was seized with pity. Besides, he was more in love 
than ever, excited by the very disdain of the beautiful girl, so fresh 
and young. He took courage and approached her once more . 

" Pascaline, I do not now propose to you merely because I can offer 
you a fine social position. But you are certainly killing yourself with 
work ; and if anything should happen to you, your father would cer- 
tainly die of hunger. Maxime is dead, Pascaline. You ought, I think, 
to marry me and save your father." 

She never answered a word, but while she cried silently she allowed 
the old man to take her hand. So Moise went to Father Pascal and 
told him all. The old man shook his head and responded slowly : 

" Good ! good ! No hay pajoros en los nidos de otono ! " (There 
are no birds in the nests of autumn.) 

But they did not kneel before the old man, and the old man did 
not bless them. 



Three days before the wedding day, just at the moment of the 
autumn equinox, the pretty Basque was walking along the light- 
house path, near the grotto, when a voice behind her cried : 

" Pascaline ! O Pascaline ! " 

Trembling like a leaf, she murmured, " Maxime ! thee, Maxime ! " 
and like a wounded bird fell into her lover's arms. It was indeed he ; 
still handsome, though thin and pale. He pressed her to his breast 
very, very tightly. 

" It is not true — tell me, it is not true thou wilt marry Moise 
Dunez ? " 

" It is true. If I do not marry him, my father will die for want 
of food. Why didst thou not come back ? " 



34G FICTION. 

" Because the Spaniards captured me and kept me in prison. But 
I am now free, and I can work." 

"But what would become of father, should they capture thee 
again ? " 

" Speak not of such things, dearest ; let us not discuss them. I 
love thee." 

And he covered her face with kisses, and he drew her gently 
toward the grotto, and she resisted not ; and in the soft light of the 
great cave they talked to each other in low, very low tones, each 
pressed to each other's heart in infinite ecstasy of reciprocal love. 
But at last, tearing herself from his arms, she said : 

" 'Tis late, late ! Let me go now ; I hear midnight striking." 

" Nay, 'tis not midnight ; 'tis only a flight of sea-gulls whirring 
by"— 

A long time afterward she said : 

" Oh, how the sea roars ! "What if we should be swallowed up ! " 

" Nay, 'tis not the sea roaring ; 'tis only the chanting of our love." 

A long time afterward she said once more : 

" O Maxim e, dost not hear how the wind raves ? " 

" Nay, 'tis not the raving of winds ; 'tis Our Lady of Guadalupe 
passing by ! The last hours of our life are the first of our night of 
love. Thou shaft never marry the Other now ! Lo ! love, this is our 
nuptial chamber ; and the wave shall be our vast green winding- 
sheet ! " 

And he closed her mouth with kisses of fire. 



They found the twain next day interlocked in the embrace of death, 
and that grotto is still called La Chambre d' Amour. The old man is 
now quite paralyzed. He begs for alms beneath the shadow of the 
church walls. He seldom speaks, but from time to time men hear 
him muttering to himself : 

" Woe ! woe ! La esperanza era verde, y un borrico la comio ! " 
(" Hope was green, and an ass devoured it.") 

[Translated Jrom the French.] 



LE TOMBEAF BLANC. 



BY JOHN DIMITKY. 



[John Bull Smith Dimitry, or John Dimitry, as he usually signs his name, is the 
eldest son of Professor Alexander Dimitry. Born at Washington, D. C. , December 27, 
1835, he was educated at College Hill, near Raymond, Miss. During his father's term 
as United States Minister to Nicaragua and Costa Rica he was Secretary of the Lega- 
tion. During the Civil War he served the Confederacy, first as a soldier in the Army 
of Tennessee, then as chief clerk of the Post Office Department, at Richmond. In 
1874-76 he was Professor of English and French in Colegio Caldas, Barranquilla, 
United States of Colombia. He was, for seven years, dramatic and literary critic of the 
New Orleans Times. In 1881-89 he was editorially connected with the New York Mail 
and Express. His History and Geography of Louisiana (1877) was for many years a 
popular text-book in the public schools of the State. His Atahualpa's Curtain (1888) 
is a semi-historical novel, treating mainly of the customs of the people of the United 
States of Colombia. His latest literary production is The Queen's Letters, an historical 
drama in five acts.] 



There was no doubt of it. Fernancl Torres had the freshest, 
pinkest complexion of any man in the great city of the Crescent, 
wherein those two natural enemies, trade and music, for three-quarters 
of a century, have worked together in the pleasantest of unions. 

This Fernand was a man — and his type is not met too often — 
whom men could respect without envy, and women love without 
humiliation. For the men, he had the muscles of Milo and the graces 
of Juan Giron. It was he who had set the city agog, after a foolish 
wager, by tooling a six-in-hand pony-trap along the " Shell Road." 
It was he who had ridden his own " Lightning" in a famous race won 
by that more famous horse — the proudest victory recorded in the 
chronicles of the old " Ridge." It was he who had struggled for a 
brave five minutes with the rushing waters of the Father-stream and 
brought out all dripping but safe, all pale but heroic, a certain 
Mademoiselle de Beaumanoir. For the rest, he was a pronounced 
dandy, affected the fragrant Viuditas of Ambalema, opened the freest 
of purses, had the readiest ear for needy friends, and the scantiest 
memory of favors granted. In short, he was the half of a modern 
Admirable Crichton, one who would have ridden shoulder to shoulder 
with the marvellous Scotchman at the tilting matches of the Louvre, 
although he might not have cared particularly to claim brotherhood 
with him in his bout with the wise heads of the University of Paris. 



348 FICTION. 

" A devilish fine fellow,'' cried the club men ; " but, by Jove ! too 
much of a prig. Why doesn't Fernand drink and gamble like the 
rest of us ? " 

" Isn't he handsome I " sighed the society girls, " so strong, so 
noble-looking, so rich ; but, dear me ! just a little too good. Why 
doesn't he flirt like the rest of them ? " 

To speak the truth, Fernand's comrades were not without cause for 
complaint. He was — in his inmost nature— something more than they 
were allowed to know ; a quite other creature than the courtly man 
known to society, the stately framer of compliments to fashionable 
beauties, the breathful swimmer who could cheat even the Mississippi 
of its prey, and the bold rider who on the Metairie could win heavy 
stakes and laughingly decline to receive them. Somebody asked 
lightly, of Fernanda friend, Pere Rouquette, what he thought of him. 

" Ce cher Fernand," quietly replied Chahta-Ima,* while he pressed 
back with both hands his long black curls, "is a veritable modern 
Saint Christopher. He has broad shoulders, you say ? Eh Men ! so 
had Saint Christopher." 

This nut was the very next day presented to Society, which at 
once tried its teeth on it. " Saint Christopher's shoulders were broad," 
exclaimed Society ; " hon ! but what has that to do with Fernand ? " 

Puzzle or no puzzle, there was one point I wish to make plain, on 
which everybody agreed. Fernand's complexion was simply perfect. 
" A surface white as snow touched with the blush of the arbutus," was 
what a dainty admirer, evidently feminine, had called it. To say the 
truth, there were some in the circle who were rather envious of that 
pink blushing in the snow. 

Who was Fernand, after all ? He was a camjxignard, not a city 
man. He was the heir, as he had been the only child, of a wealthy 
planter, whose magnificent plantation spread a mile or more along the 
low banks of Bayou Lafourche in Louisiana. A grave old citizen 
remembered well that, somewhere about the '30's, Torres pere had 
taken refuge in this free country from the vengeance of a volcanic 
government in New Granada. That he was rich was proved by his 
purchase, cash down, of a splendid estate, house, lands, slaves, and by 
his subsequent style of living. He recollected perfectly that the wife, 
a beautiful woman crowned with piet} 7- , had died in a few years (he 
had forgotten how many), and of what disease he had no clear idea. 

" As to Camille, he died in 1855," said the grave old citizen, exhal- 
ing, meditatively, the smoke of his cigarette. 

Of the son, he had known nothing until his appearance in the city. 

* " Chahta-Ima " (Choctaw-Leader) is a name given by the Indians to Pere Adrien 
Rouquette, the poet-priest of Louisiana, and their apostle. 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 349 

What, between those dates, had really become of him \ That was soon 
displayed by the youth himself on several open pages before an eager 
Society, which turned all its eye-glasses upon them. He had gone to 
Heidelberg, had not come out ill in its student-quarrels, had returned 
after an extended tour to receive his dying father's blessing, and had 
come to pass the winter in New Orleans, which, in the two languages 
of the Mother State, is known as the " city " and " la mile." 

About himself there was no mystery — not the smallest. But could 
the same be said of an old Indian woman, who was his constant com- 
panion — who had stood by him in student-quarrels at Heidelberg — 
who would not be left behind during his tour in the East — who insisted 
on keeping clean his rooms in Paris, London, New York — and who 
was now doing the same service in his quiet chambers on Royal Street ? 

Some had chanced to meet Conflanza, as she was named — a tall, lean 
woman, whose head was persistently muffled in a mantilla ; a woman 
who, though unbent with the years that had crowned that head with 
the glory of old age, had a strong-set, many-wrinkled face ; a woman 
with a swarthy skin, and a wistful look that seemed to tell of inward 
wrestlings ; a woman, in a word, cursed by one absorbing thought. 

Here the opened page of Fernand's story came to an end. But 
there was another page — a tender, timid page, which no one could 
read save Fernand, Confianza, and a certain fair young girl who lived 
in his own parish. 

A flutter of interest, as sudden as it was temporary, had some time 
before centred in this very young lady, Mademoiselle Blanche de 
Beaumanoir, because, as already told, she had, while crossing the ferry 
to Algiers, lost her balance and fallen overboard in mid-stream. Her 
preserver, Fernand himself, was thrown forward, at this supreme 
moment, into the broad glare that falls upon all gallant saviors of 
endangered beauty. 

He did not take over-kindly to the glare. No more did Mademoi- 
selle Blanche, who, however, had never shone more brightly than 
when friends trooped around her to congratulate her. At last, con- 
gratulations ceased perforce. Mademoiselle Blanche, it was given 
out, had returned to her country home. No one noticed it — yet such 
was the fact — that, after this incident, Fernand's visits to his planta- 
tion were more frequent and more prolonged than before. 

Fortunately, there was no icy rigueur of Creole domestic life to 
block the happiness of these two. It had melted before the priceless 
services of the suitor. I do not say that the good people on Bayou 
Lafourche did not suspect this happy idyl dropping its roses among 
them. To the proverbial walls with ears must be added the proverbial 
servants with tongues. Gossip flew on free wing around the neighbor- 



350 FICTION. 

hood of La Quinta de Bolivar, as Torres pere had named his Southern 
home, or La Quinte, as the popular ignorance had corrupted it. But 
it never reached the city. 

It was in the spring-time. The magnolia grandiflora was slowly 
baring her white bosom to the eager sun, while the myrtle tossed him, 
in odorous coquetry, her plumed crest ; the mystic oleander, telling of 
desert founts and dark-haired Arabian girls, was opening its rosy 
petals ; and when the sun had left his loves lamenting to seek an 
unknown couch beyond the cypriere, a great, heavy, pervading per- 
fume, coming from under the wings of the night, told of the nearness 
of the jasmine. But above all these scents there stole over the railings 
on low, broad balconies fronting the bayou, and in the causeries high 
and low, the gentle odor of orange blossoms — blossoms that were not 
real, but were the gracious prophecies of coming happy hours, a sacred 
altar, and a holy ring. 

II. 

One star-lit night in April, the moon rose clear, full, queenly. She 
threw the forest into gloom, but touched with silver the broad- 
spreading fields in front of it. And as the waters of the bayou caught 
upon their dark and frowning bosom her radiance, they broke into 
rippling laughter and flowed in smiles gulf ward. 

Beaumanoir itself was all brilliant with light, which blazed through 
the open doors and windows. M. de Beaumanoir had this evening, 
through a soiree, made a formal announcement of the engagement of 
Fernand and Blanche. The spacious rooms were crowded. At every 
door and window the slaves, with open mouths but tender hearts, 
were watching that mysterious process which was to usher Mamselle 
into the dignity of Madame. The vast grounds were filled with a 
motley crowd, because the poorer neighbors and slaves alike had 
come to catch that light of joy which, like marriage in the Mother 
Church, comes but once in a lifetime. The veranda was here and 
there lit by colored lanterns. Through the raised windows was to be 
caught the flitting of the dancers ; and the sound of laughter and 
music made the outer crowd, under the trees of the avenue, turn 
round and round in many a fantastic twirl unknown to the guests. 

While eyes and ears among the open-mouthed servants at the doors 
and windows, among the uninvited guests in the garden and on the 
grounds, are fully occupied, two figures leave the brilliant parlors to 
take the air. 

" Mais, v>la Mhieu Fernand" cries a voice. " Yes," echoes another. 
" M'sieu Fernand and Mamselle Blanche ! " 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 35! 

The lookers-on were right. It was Fernand and Blanche who had 
appeared on the veranda. The conversation was as brief as iudo-ino. 
from signs it must have been tender. To the horror of gossiiS 
female, and to the chuckles and nudgings of veteran gossips male, the 
watchers without saw a sudden lifting of Mademoiselle Blanche's face 
and a bend of M'sieu Fernand's. And there was not one of the unseen 
observers who would not have said that there had been a kiss given 
and taken on the broad veranda of Beaumanoir, under the blessing; of 
the full moon. to 

A light form was seen gliding back to the parlors, Fernand remain- 
ing behind. One old gossip under the trees thus commented ■ " Tien s 
you see M'sieu Fernand. He stay to tank de Ion Bleu. Oui-,1,, ) 
mats tl a bon raisonP 

But something else was presently visible ; for at a bound Fernand 
had left his place and was fighting fire-fire that seemed to envelop a 
woman A Japanese lantern, hung in the doorway, had caught fire 
burnt the cord that upheld it, and had fallen upon the light Spanish 
wrap worn by Blanche. It was but a moment for Fernand to grasp 
the filmy lace fastened by a pin, to tear it burning from his darWs 
form and with his hands and feet to crush out the leaping flames All 
told, he had not been sixty seconds at it. But the guests in alarm were 
now crowding the veranda. Mademoiselle Blanche had come out of 
it well Her white neck was slightly blistered. By good fortune her 
lace— that lovely face-had escaped uninjured. And as to Fernand 
only his clothes had suffered. ' 

" See," he cried, holding out the brave hands which had fought the 
flames and conquered them, "see, friends, my hands are not even 
scorched ! " 

Each guest judged the miracle from his own point of view 
" It takes Fernand to be lucky," called out his acquaintances 
Monsieur Torres is surely protected by God," echoed Made- 
moiselle Blanche. 

" The most amazing thing I ever heard in my life," shouted that old 
hero General Victoire. "Sacre bleu ! What would I not have driven 
to haye had that Fernand at Chalmette! and thou, too, Beaumanoir 
wouldst thou not ? Fire enough behind the barricades there for any 
salamander, eh, man brave?" And the veteran chuckled while he 
took a huge pinch of Perique/^. 

" There is something abnormal in this," was Dr. Tousage's profes- 
sional comment, whispered to himself. 

Once again Fernand's cheery voice was heard. Exhibiting wrist- 
band and coat-sleeve all charred, leaving the strong muscular arm 
mocking at the trial by fire, he exclaimed laughingly • 



352 FICTION. 

" I am off. It is early — a little past nine o'clock. La Quinte is 
a bare half-mile away. A sharp gallop, and it will be but a short ten 
minutes to change my clothes and return. Don't wait for me. Let 
the dance go on. An revoir, mesdamesP 

And with the light limbs of young manhood he was away. He 
reined his horse where he saw a light in a room — a light that told of 
the faithful watch of his old nurse. Crazy with joy he burst upon 
her. "Why not ? He looked upon his last adventure as the crown of 
his love. Surely it was he who had been destined from creation to 
be Blanche's savior. He was full of that proud happiness which is 
born of danger encountered for one beloved. "What true lover would 
not rejoice if, twice, his love had owed her life to him % 

" Here, Confianza, another coat and a clean shirt ! I have been 
fighting fire." 1 " 1 

" Fightin' de fire ? " 

" Yes ; see what it has done." 

He laughed as he showed his coat and shirt, both burned and well- 
nigh sleeveless. The old woman had no eyes for these. She had crept 
close to him, and was caressing his hands nervously — furtively almost, 
as it seemed. 

" An' de poor hands — dey must hurt you, no ? " 

" They ? Not at all. Why, now I come to think of it, that is the 
most astonishing part of it all. Old General Victoire was right. I 
am a real salamander." 

" Hijo 7nio, que estd diciendome f " broke forth from the old Indian 
in her native tongue, as she leaped to her feet, all trembling. 

She stood as might some Priestess of the Sun, devoted unto death, 
when the head of royal Atahualpa deluged with its sacred blood the 
holy Peanan Stone ! 

Fernand was struck by the old woman's look. Once before had 
he seen it — once, when a round, dull white mark had come upon his 
forehead, stayed for a month, and then, fought by science, had left 
the tiniest of scars. That was when he was a student at Heidelberg, 
and holding his own in the fighting-gardens of Zur Hirschgasse. 
Once afterward it had appeared — this time on his broad breast — but 
he had said nothing of it to Confianza. 

"Don't be crazy, dear old nurse. Look at my hands. Touch 
them for yourself ; there is nothing wrong about them. I said that I 
fought the fire ; I was wrong. I only played with it. Come, kiss 
your boy, and after that, a clean shirt and another coat ! " 

She threw her withered arms around Fernancl's neck. She pressed 
her lips to his mouth — one looking on might well think with a touch 
of sublime defiance. She kissed his two hands — those hands that were 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 353 

so strong and had been so brave. Then she sat on the floor near him 
still holding them within her own. She tried to amiJ w •* ' 
not a smile that would have done one good totee *"**> ^ * ™ 
Fernand," she said gently, «tu remember of dat book which hi 
papa to you gave when tu has not more of q uinee aZs" * 

that i / ^ii read lt a dozen tilnes or ™ore. But what his 

tnat to do with my erring out % r»™'+ , 1 ™ , as 

for me ? » g y ° U know Blail che is waiting 

The old woman seemed not to hear him 

J f *?£* ^ a book ** was-dose poor peoples ? » 
She felt the hands on which her tears were now streaming growing 
cold. They did not tremble but th* nhiu ^ + i ""showing 

" My God !— not this— not this ' " 

J„X, , " n <l«^tood now his doom too well • but he 

feSaE* ^H a f-,' le be f" t0 1>ace the ™om )fil ,t'ov" 
wV T ■ ™ k dld not leave hi s cheeks; but his eyes o-lit 

ered mteously.yet half defiantly, like those of a noble ani na earn ht 
m a trap unaware. The old woman, still seated on the floo, was 
reeiUng her rosary. There were words that came unMddenTo Z 
sacred beads words of a personal application, that, through tears tell 

"MTTJt' aml better Still > ° f haman *»* ! « ^ Diy It fi y 1 
a!w G0C l, have mer °y «1™> my boy! May God haye mercy » 

"My God ! what have I done to deserve this > " 

Vhich a SuS wafb^ Strk i eS ' Femand halted befOTe the tabic, °" 
JT ■ aS bl "' mn S'- Selzln g <&> l™p, he deliberately circled 

left hand p"™ 7 - "^ ^ right b ^ 1 Then ^ <*-ped it wi h Ms 

fite^fteXTtTe otl^r lm ^' * ** « "- -** I- the 

to *5z«?&£^" he said cok% ; " T mast ■* s o «■* 

" Que Dios.tenga piedad de mi hijo ! " (May God have mercy or, 
my boy!) rose again from the praying woman. She knew Te/boy 



354 FICTION. 

well. Whosoever might be deceived by his calmness, it was not she 
who had nursed him — oh, no, not she ! 

" The fire-test is satisfactory," continued Fernand, in a tone that 
appalled her. " There can be no illusion here. The leper's skin can 
burn, but the burn leaves no mark ; nor can pain be felt. My hands 
should have been burned ; I feel no pain ; it is clear, then, / am a 
leper ! " 

" Que Dios tenga piedad de mi hijo ! Por Dios ! Par su Santis- 
sima Madre ! Por todos los Santos y Santas del cielo!" (May God 
have mercy on my boy ! For Christ's sake ! For His holy Mother's 
sake ! For the sake of all the saints and angels of Heaven !) wailed 
once more from the floor, like a prayer for a parting soul. It was 
unheard by Fernand. A bitter smile passed over his lips as he said : 

" But come ! Blanche must not be forgotten. She must learn this 
charming finale to our hopes and our loves." 

Paper, pen, and ink were before him. Not pausing to cull phrases, 
much less to think, he wrote a note and put it into an envelope which 
he sealed. Einging a bell, a black presented himself. 

" Baptiste, take this letter at once to Mademoiselle Blanche. Place 
it in her own hands. You need not report." 

After Baptiste had left, Fernand said : 

" My good Confianza, I wish to be alone. Leave me now. To- 
morrow, by eight o'clock, let Dr. Tousage be here." 

He did not leave the chair through the long black night. He was 
alone — alone with the sorrowful Sister of Human Prayer. He made 
no movement, he breathed no sigh, he murmured no word through 
all the hours, but fell like a death-bell upon the heart of the figure 
crouched like a faithful dog, on the other side of his chamber door. 

And so the bright sun found them. 

III. 

Baptiste' s master had told him that he need not report the result 
of his visit to Mademoiselle Blanche. But long before noon the next 
day, Fernand, had he chosen, might have heard his story from a hun- 
dred tongues. There was not a guest at Beaumanoir, over night, that 
had not borne it away, through the darkness and gardenia-scented air, 
a fearful but delicious burden. There was not a passenger on the boat 
which had left that morning, who was not carrying Fernand's name, 
and blasted love, a morsel of the juiciest for the delectatiou of the 
great city. His tragic story, too, was in the mouths, and had touched 
the hearts, and had filled the eyes, of rude but sympathetic workers 
a-field in the early summer sunshine ; and there was a dew that had 



LE TOMBEA U BLANC. 355 

not fallen from the sky upon many a plough-handle and many an axe- 
helve. For there was not a slave at Beamnanoir or La QmWthat had 
not prayed to hear the joyful marriage-bells, which would bring the 
two plantations under the same master and mistress 

Then too, there were-unhappily, not far off-men and women 
whom all avoided; men and women hobbling on crutches, crawling 
aground, moaning on pestiferous beds, who, selfish by nature, had for 
once been brought together, not in cynicism but pity. To them the 

oZleT "v ^f h 'i 7" K ? MB Mtter ' aS ^^ as their 
own flesh. Fernand had been their truest friend and most fearless 

neighbor. « Z„„ un Ujpreu, ? Man Dieu ! if he has got it f rom ^ 

we are accursed indeed » old Pere Carancro had said ; and with blurreS 

eyes and shaking hands, all had concurred. 

After all, what had happened at Beamnanoir « 

u-tatri v ent TT t0 ^T^' f aptiStG had S ° Ug ' ht Ma ^oiselle Blanche 
pnvately. He had found her seated with two friends, Mademoiselle 
Diane de Monplaisir and Mademoiselle Marie Bonsecour, in a sTnaH 
room giving on the veranda and opening into the parlor through a 
cur amed door. Bapti ste on presenting the note, had simply J? : 
Mamselle Blanche M'sieu Fernand, he tell me to give dis to you » 
Mademoiselle Blanche had opened the note eagerly. It could not 
,Z 1 ffi g ' TJ?* ltS C ° ntentS W ^en & over-pleasant. So 

tZ7l ™ ed Madem 7 0iSelle Dkne ' Wh ° added that Bla ^ ^d 
turned pale, rnms am, pale comme la mart- had uttered a faint moan, 

W t W r 1 g IV^ fr ° m ^ ° hair ' had fallen back insensible 
A hat had become of the note itself I Mademoiselle Diane had kept her 
black marmoset eyes fixed upon that She declared dramatically that 
MatmZn 6 M anChe , bad thr ° Wn {t hai ^ hti ^ a ^ afl^ reading it 
the nX f ft f 7Pu° W T\^ n0t agree With her - She said that 
uncontiol ' ^ n0t faUen lmtil Manche became 

Bad news fills the air like electricity. It was scarce a moment 
before the curtained doors were torn aside, and a crowd of well-bred 
wTfhV^r 8 ' g r tS Ca T strearain S **> the room. At their head 
from , !n ! e nf 7 aS T* W roachin g hi * ^ughter, but, hearing 

trom a mob of angels m white organdie and tulle that she had re- 
covered consciousness, he was turning aside when he felt his arm 
touched gently. It was Mademoiselle* Diane who had touched mm 
She pointed silently to a letter on the floor. Monsieur de Beamnanoir 
picked it up. It was strange. He was in a white heat of anger, cer- 

« wi ! ' ° n f Gading H ' hG did not look so much an gry as puzzled 

is thi f" ""I P b ? ? " ^ mUttereCl " Vmime ^ ™ ™A/^ 
is this Fernand. But come, my friends," he called out, in a loud voice 



356 FICTION. 

to the crowd of guests who had already thronged the room. "Made- 
moiselle mafille is in good hands. This note is from Monsieur Torres. 
She has been somewhat excited by that, and is naturally nervous. 
The whole affair is a riddle to me. Perhaps some among you may 
read it for me." 

The crowd surged back, still curious-eyed, but clearly more anxious 
than when it had torn away the curtained door. 

Monsieur de Beaumanoir had stationed himself by the mantel, on 
which blazed, with their double score of waxen lights, the great golden 
candelabras that had descended, son to son, from that doughty knight, 
Sieur Kaoul de Beaumanoir, who had died with Bayard hard by the 
bloody waters of the Sesia. I do not know how it was, but the fair 
women in gauze and the Avhite-cravatted men seemed to be a court ; 
Blanche forced to be the plaintiff ; Fernand, the defendant ; and the 
owner of the mansion the advocate of the — mystery. For mystery in 
that note there must be, so whispered one to the other, those flurried 
beauties that circled, in broadening folds, around the mantel, and, as 
they whispered, turned just a little pale. 

For his part, M. de Beaumanoir, a trifle puzzled and unmistakably 
stirred, seemed nowise anxious. He re-opened the note impetuously. 

ISo date, no address, no signature. Nothing save these words : 

" Do not misjudge me ; but I must not go back to-night. You have seen the 
last of me. Oh, my God ! to think that i" have seen the last of you! I do not 
know wherein we have offended Heaven ; but God is angry with us. I am what 
they call — I am — I dare not write what loathsome creature I have become to myself 
since a half hour. Bead Second Chronicles, chapter xxvi., verse 20. That verse 
speaks for me who cannot. Read it, and you will know why I have hasted to go out 
from what to me was not a sanctuary of the Father, but higher still, his Paradise." 

Nervously removing his spectacles, M. de Beaumanoir turned 
interrogatively to the brilliant company. 

" Eh Men ! " said a pert and petted beauty ; " cest une question de 
la Bible. Let us see the Bible." 

Mademoiselle uttered the voice of Society. 

" Yes, yes ; where is the Bible % " cried all. 

A youth of tender mustache, and with the reddest of roses granted 
him by the grace of Mademoiselle Diane, had, at that lady's nod, 
already sought the great Douay Bible, which rested upon a side table 
immediately under a sword crossed with its scabbard upon the wall. 
Without a word he put the book into the hands of M. de Beaumanoir. 
The gray old man, mustached like a veteran of Chalmette, opened the 
Holy Book gingerly, as though he did not know, gallant gentleman 
and ex-sabreur that he was, its quiet pages quite so well as the temper of 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 357 

his sabre. He had seen the volume certainly, but only accidentally, 
so to speak, as he might be leaning over it to read for the thousandth 
time the inscription : " Tribute to — hem ! — by admiring company — 
h wm ! — patriotic services — ha ! — January 8, 1815." Written in French, 
bound in Kussia, heavily edged with gold, and published in Paris, the 
Sacred Word, while being little noticed by the master, had brought 
comfort to the late Madame de Beaumanoir, as it was, without his 
knowledge, the daily guide of his daughter. 

The company drew nearer to the father. From the press of loveli- 
ness, as might a dainty Bourbon rose from a basket of flowers, stepped 
Mademoiselle Diane de Monplaisir. It was she who crept close to the 
side of M. de Beaumanoir, and with her jewelled fingers turned the 
leaves till her index finger rested upon the chapter and the verse 
which were to reveal the mystery devouring her. With a stately old- 
fashioned bow, though with no suspicion of the tragic story in verse 
20, the old man read these words slowly aloud : 

" And Azariah, the chief priest, and all thepriests, looked upon him, and, behold, 
he was leprous, and they thrust him out from thence ; yea, himself hasted to go out, 
because the Lord had smitten him." 

At these words, so passionless yet so vivid, so filled with fire yet 
so death-cold, a great hush fell upon the company. It was as though 
a breeze laden with the poisonous breath of poppies had passed 
through the room. Psychologists tell us that a single thought may 
work in madness upon a crowd, a thought springing not fr< >m a visible 
danger, but from the spur of a hidden terror. Of such must have 
been the feeling, which swept like a cyclone over the joyful throng 
that had been drinking in excitement under the golden lights to the 
sound of voluptuous music. A thought of flight, certain, no matter 
how or whither, only that it should be that very instant, out of the 
house, out of the grounds, out into the open road, shining yellow- 
white under the full moon — anywhere, anywhere beyond the evil 
spirit that had seized upon the princely hospitality of Beaumanoir, and 
was even then draping, by a mystic and awful hand, its laughing walls 
in mourning. 

In the saure qui pent of an army, pride is thrown aside with the 
knapsack. In the sauve qui pent of Society, it is courtesy that is 
dropped with the slippers. 

One by one the courtly company, with its color and its glitter and 
its laughter, left the salon. One by one, without even a nod to their 
old host who stood more dazed than indignant on his threshold, they 
streamed, with burnous and nubias, and what not, snatched pell-mell 
on the way, down the broad steps of the front veranda, and into the 



358 FICTION. 

gravelled walk, where were the carriages of the ladies and the horses 
of their escorts. For once, one may fancy, there was none of that 
idle talk — none of those soft whispers, those empty phrases, those 
vaporous compliments, given with an air and received with a blush — 
that make up the unwritten literature of carriage- windows. A mighty 
fear shook all, and the colored coachmen were told in sharp tones, 
altogether new to those fatted favorites, to drive fast and stop at 
nothing. Through the noble avenue of live oaks, famous throughout 
that section, through the Arcadian scene, under Chinese lanterns, by 
rustic groups at their simple pleasures, the carriages thundered, and 
the riders rushed by plying whip and spur. 

Among the last that reached her carriage was Mademoiselle Diane 
de Monplaisir. She was in no sense excited — that young lady was 
too poised for that, but it had suited her to play with the fears of her 
friends. Her garments had rustled with the rest down the steps, but, 
on leaving the salon, she had been particularly careful respectfully to 
courtesy before her host, as he stood erect at his post like a forgotten 
sentinel. Having given this lesson of social tact, she thought herself 
justified in raising her voice to a decorously high pitch, and saying, in 
the shape of a problem presented to her escorts : " Mafbi, Messieurs, is 
not this a pretty comedy with which Monsieur Torres has favored us '. " 

Trained though they were in the young lady's imperious service, 
none of these gallants answered. The call was too sudden, and the 
danger altogether too pressing for that. 

It had not struck eleven o'clock before the mansion, still blazing 
with the lights of a joyous betrothal, was left to the ghosts destined 
to haunt its walls so long as they shall stand. Of the hundred who 
had frou-froued that evening up the carpeted steps, who had opened 
very promising flirtations of their own, who had envied Blanche while 
they coveted Fernand, not one remained save Dr. Tousage and Made- 
moiselle Marie Bonsecour. It was not long after that hour that the 
doctor himself, having seen that Blanche was recovered and in gentle 
hands, took leave of the old man, who sat crushed and broken under 
the wasting lights of the great golden candelabras. As he descended 
the steps, Dr. Tousage said to himself : " I must refer to my abnormal 
cases. It was what I suspected. There was something extraordinary 
in his insensibility to fire. I shall see Fernand to-morrow." 

For that matter, Dr. Tousage, had he chosen, might have suspected 
years and years before. He had known Fernand's mother. He had 
attended her in her last illness, and had seen with surprise the ante- 
mortal pallor give place to a post-mortal rosiness. The case had been 
something beyond his experience. He had contented himself with 
classing among his " Abnormal Cases " this woman who had looked 



LE TOMBEAV BLANC. 359 

as blooming in her coffin as she had done in her boudoir, and whose 
roses in death were like the gorgeous blossom plucked from the twin 
sister of Rappacini's daughter. 

The good doctor had taken no account, however, of the fact that 
La Quinte, fronting broad on the bayou, and spreading deep in smiling 
fields of sugar-cane, back to the great funereal cypriere, bordered 
perilously on a world ostracized by the world, between which and it 
there rises a wall broader, deeper, higher, more deadly repellent, than 
ever Chinese fear raised against Tartar aggression. A world not 

O Do 

populous, save in wrecked hopes, harrowing dreams, and mournful 
shadows. A world of agonized hearts, of putrid ulcers, of flesh drop- 
ping from rotting bones, of Selfishness holding a Spartan throne with 
Horror, of the Divine likeness distorted, year by year, till the very 
semblance of man, born in His gracious image, comes to be blotted 
out. A world, the men and women in which are players in a life- 
tragedy, to which Hamlet is a comedy, and the Duchess of Malfi a 
melodrama. 

A terrible world this — in short, a world of Lepers. 

In the parish of Lafourche, along Bayou Lafourche, there are lepers 
as poisonous as Naaman, and as incurable as Uzziah. It is an old 
story barely touched here, not even surfaced. It is a curse which law- 
makers, in these later days, are called upon to rub out or to wall around. 
Practically, there has always been a walling around this curse — this 
blot — whatsoever one may choose to call it ; practically, because the 
neighbors of these unhappy people have lost the sentiment of neighbor- 
liness. The feeling against them is as old as the first human deformity, 
and as bitter as the first human prejudice. What has happened to 
races before them, offending the eye of civilization, has become their 
fate. Civilization frowns upon her accursed races, her lepers, her 
Cagots, her Marrons, her Colliberts, her Chuetas. She prescribes for 
them certain metes and limits, and says to them, " O God-abandoned, 
pass not beyond these, at your peril." 

The doctors prop up with their science this feeling. They agree 
that a peculiar disease is confined to a certain class of the population 
living along Bayou Lafourche ; declare that disease to be leprosy, and 
pronounce it cureless. On their side, the sufferers protest vehemently 
in denial. No one takes their word, while they themselves, when 
compelled to wander from their fields, creep with furtive look and 
stealthy step. Like lepers everywhere, those of Bayou Lafourche are 
the Lemuridse of mankind. After all, what destroys their case is the 
single fact which separates them absolutely from their fellows — if 
mice attacked, these people never get well. Science is not always con- 
sistent ; but ages ago she pronounced a judgment against herself which 



360 FICTION. 

still stands. She admitted then, as she admits now, that she is power- 
less to heal a leper. It needs a Christ to say : " Be thou clean, and 
the leprosy is cleansed. 1 ' 

The life of these lepers, if a tragedy, has a plot of sorrow simple 
enough. There are not many of them. They may now count between 
twenty-five and fifty families, principally poor, all of whom raise their 
homes of corruption on Bayou Lafourche. They are not bunched 
together in one settlement, but stretch out along the stream a distance 
of thirty or forty miles, scenting, at one end, the soft saccharine smell 
of growing cane, and at the other the sharp saline odor of a mighty 
gulf. Their awful malady is an inheritance with them ; their suffer- 
ings are acute ; their disfigurement becomes, in time, complete ; but 
their deaths, though from the same disease, do not create an epi- 
demic. 

What the Caqueurs were to Bretagne, and the Yaqueros to the 
Asturias, these lepers are to Bayou Lafourche. Many-sided are the 
rumors about them ; but a wide-spreading, far-reaching tongue adds 
that there are among them some who are rich in this world's goods, 
and yet are forced to take this world's refuse. 

No one knew all this better than Dr. Tousage. He had been 
prominent among those brave physicians who strive to be healers. 
But, as it happened, he was not thinking of Leper-Land while riding 
slowly towards La Quinte. Honest Baptiste was in wait. There was 
a mystery about his pHit maitre — so much Baptiste knew. Confianza's 
eyes were filled with tears, and they dumfounded the simple slave. 
Traditions of any kind, save the peaceful, oftentimes tender gossip of 
La Quinte, where two generations of kindly masters had made the 
furrows of labor almost as full of roses as the " path of dalliance," had 
never turned Baptiste's brain into a race-track ; so, on the doctor's 
arrival, his eyes were full of a terror inviting inquiry, but above all 
sympathy. The doctor was pre-occupied ; he gave neither. 

tk Where is your master, Baptiste? " was all he said. 

" M'sieu Fernand, he ees in la bibliotec," replied Baptiste, with a 
certain awe crossing his terror at right angles. Baptiste fervently 
believed that the ghost of his old master walked that particular room 
at midnight. And, for that matter, it would have been hard to find 
any slave within five leagues who did not agree with Baptiste. 

" He is there, is he ? Then I know the way very well." 

Dr. Tousage found Fernand in a small, well-lighted room, divided 
from the great wide parlors, sombre even at that early hour, by a. 
falling lace curtain. The sunbeams of the morning streamed through 
the windows, glinting tenderly the backs of books of great thinkers 
loved by Don Camilo, and cherished for association's sake by his son. 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 361 

It was a chamber rich in windows as it was brilliant in light — a 
chamber for the strong, not for the weak. 

" Sajyristi ! " said the doctor to himself, " open windows are a sign 
of joy. The case is not so hopeless, after all." 

The good doctor was wrong for once. Fernand had lost hope ; 
or, rather, despair had pushed hope from its place, and there brooded. 
The young man was seated by a table on which were laid two books. 
One was a copy of the Bible ; the other, MaundrePs work on the 
Syrian leprosy, a very old book, and as rare as it is old. Rising as 
his old friend entered, for the first time in his life he did not offer his 
hand. 

" Be pleased to take a seat, doctor." 

" Eh lien ! Fernand, what is all this ? You, a Hercules, and 
sick ? " 

The attempt at ease, if intended to deceive, was a failure. 

The young man faced his visitor. 

" Stop, doctor. This is no time for comedy. I am still a Hercules, 
if brawn and muscle and twenty-five years can make one. But there 
is a plague about me more deadly to bear than Dejanira's robe." 

" And that plague is — ? " 

" Leprosy ! " 

" Have you convinced yourself of that ? " 

" Perfectly ; and you also, you need not deny it. I have not studied 
that kindly face so long without being able to read it." 

" To speak frankly, I am not surprised. But does the disease really 
exist ? It is because I wish to assure myself on this point that I have 
come. Think over my question quietly." 

" Look at this, doctor. This may help you to a conclusion." 

While sa} r ing this he was throwing open his shirt, revealing a small 
white-reddish sore slowly eating into his brawny chest. 

" I have never been, as you know, doctor, much of what you call 
a thinking man. At any rate, I have taken this to be the mysterious 
' date-mark,' which, at some time in his life, pursues and brands each 
traveller to Bagdad. It first broke out while I was in Paris, some 
months ago. My old nurse knows nothing of it. I accepted it gayly 
enough. I argued something in this way. I had not forgotten Bag- 
dad — why should Bagdad forget me ? " 

While he was speaking, the physician had been examining the 
ulcer. He grew more thoughtful as he looked. 

" Has this increased in size since it first appeared ? " 

" Yes ; but very little." 

" Any pain '. " 

" No, I cannot say that it has pained me, but it has annoyed me 



362 FICTION. 

considerably. Remember that, until last night, whenever I thought 
of it, it was solely in connection with Bagdad. With my physique, 
what else could give it birth ? But that is over now. It is not the 
date-mark. What, then, is it ? " 

Dr. Tousage knew his young friend's courage. He did for him 
what he would not have done for a weaker soul. He took refuge in 
that truth, which is more often a kindness shown by this world's 
healers than they are given credit for. 

" This," he replied slowly, " represents a leprosy already developed." 

" And the Salamanderism of last night % " 

" Was a strong, although a wholly accidental, proof of its exist- 
ence." 

" Accidental, you think it % I look upon it rather as providential," 
retorted Fernand, while adding : " You regard my case as hopeless, 
then % " 

" Absolutely, though the danger is not immediate." 

" In other words, cher docteur, one must pay for being Hercules. 
A long life, and each knotted muscle prolonging the torture which it 
doubles, that is the story, eh ? " said the young man, bitterly, as he 
touched a bell on the table. 

In response, the old Indian nurse appeared and stood, quietly wait- 
ing, near the door. 

" Look, and then listen, doctor," said Fernand, as he pointed with 
his finger to her. " This old woman — you know her ? — has fairly 
haunted me through life. She was the one to receive me at my birth. 
She tended me through my babyhood. She protected my boyhood. 
When my mother died, she became mother and nurse in one. She 
watched me in my plays. She interfered in my disputes. She made 
me the laughing-stock of my schoolmates until I fought them into 
respect. As I grew older, I saw that in her love there was a large 
leaven of anxiety. She showed it during my years at Heidelberg. 
She grew thin and more despondent during our stay in the East. She 
hovered around me in Paris. The Quartier Latin, at a very feverish 
time, could raise no barricade against her. Mabille had no terrors 
for her. I found her everywhere on watch, and always with her eyes 
fixed wistfully on myself. It was then I took to thinking of her as a 
woman cursed with a single thought that had borrowed the intensity 
of a mania. It is not three months since I began to believe that that 
single thought might be for me. Last night I knew that I was right. 
It was she who prevented my returning to Beaumanoir. Such devo- 
tion is rare. I say again, look at her, doctor." 

Wondering a little, Science scanned Devotion. 

The woman was well worth looking at in her brown-skinned, white- 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 3G3 

haired, brave, honest, faithful old age. A prophetess of evil had she 
always been, but not of the order of Cassandra. She had foreseen. 
She had not chosen to foretell. 

Fernand resumed in a reckless manner, as though he had something 
to do that hurt him, and of which he wished to be rid : 

" Would you believe after this, doctor, when I am beaten down to 
the earth, that she refuses to speak % She talks to me in the jargon of 
my childhood. Last night she reminded me of a book containing the 
story of a leper. That is her way of telling me that I am one. There 
lies the book on the table. Have you ever read it ? Old Maundrel 
held a wise pen in his hand. He reports the case of a man in Syria, 
who knew himself to be leprous by having passed unscorched through 
flames. Confianza remembered the story, but I wish to know why 
she recalled it. — Nurse, here is the doctor. He is a friend, and a 
true one. In his presence, tell me why you have feared for me through 
all these years." 

The old Indian remained silent. Her tongue was bound by a 
pledge that it could not break. The dead in their graves forge chains 
indissoluble. 

" But I can tell you, Fernand," said the doctor, gravely, " what 
Confianza, under oath, dares not." 

" You ! And what — what can you tell % " 

" Your mother died a leper ! " 

IV. 

The small world about La Quinte had soon a tidbit to roll around 
its tongue more to its taste than even that delicious morsel from Beau- 
manoir. Workmen, it heard, were busy building a cottage under the 
ancient live oak that was old when Iberville's ships sailed through 
the waters of Manchac, and moss-crowned when simple Acadiens from 
the Northern ice, camping under it, broke out in wild enthusiasm 
over its knotted knees and spreading boughs, while their children 
plucked the giant by his frosty beard, and shouted gleefully as they 
crowned themselves with the mossy theft. The same oak had, for 
generations, been the pride of the country round. They called it 
lovingly le Pere C/iene, the Father Oak. Superstition had added a 
special charm to its head, grown gray in the circling rings of a thou- 
sand years. Lovers' vows, pledged under it, for once ceased to be false, 
and a happy marriage never failed, it was fervently believed, to follow 
the kisses for which the old tree had for ages stood sponsor. To build 
a cottage under* the Pere Chene, therefore, was a violent shock given 
to the love, the pride, the superstition of the entire neighborhood. 



364 FICTION. 

But what could love, pride, or superstition say ? The tree itself was 
private property ; the old gray beard stood on land belonging to La 
Quinte. It was quite clear, therefore, that the owner had ordered the 
erection of the cottage, and that he had a right to do so. 

Mademoiselle de Monplaisir spoke the voice of a critical circle : 

" Ma foi, G , est Men noble de la part de M. Torres. He wishes to be 
near his kin." 

There was always a sting in the honey vouchsafed by this young 
lady to her friends. The sting in this particular honey was that 
Leper-Land began within half a league below the lower terminus of 
La Quinte. 

A low-roofed, broad-verandaed cottage soon nestled under the pro- 
tecting branches of the old tree. The roof once reached, farm wagons, 
filled with furniture, stirred up the white dust of the Bayou highway. 
Then came carts filled with books. The cottage itself was only a 
three days' wonder, after all. Something came afterward, that was to 
prove a plethoric, full-mouthed, nine days' talk. After the last cart 
had deposited its burden, the workmen reappeared. They came in 
crowds. In an amazingly short time, a great whitewashed brick wall 
rose high enough to look down upon the cottage, which it had been 
built to screen. It loomed up full thirty feet in the air, stretching in 
a square on all sides of the giant oak, whose head, turbaned in mosses, 
could be seen behind it from the road and from boats passing swiftly 
on the Bayou. There was nothing cheerful in this strange pile. In 
the sunlight it looked like a prison ; in the moonlight, like a grave- 
yard. The Panteon of Bogota is not more ghost-like. 

The wall being finished, but one entrance was left to the interior. 
This was at the lower end, to the rear, where a strong oak door, iron- 
bound, challenged the way. On the side of that door was a turn- 
window in the wall, through which could be passed such articles as 
might be needed for the dweller within. Close to that window and 
outside of the wall was a small hut. It was the home of Confianza — 
martyr to the child of her love in his weakness, as she had been faith- 
ful to him in his young strength under the skies of Damascus and on 
the shining shores of the Mediterranean. 

And what did Society, that part of it which whispers its wisdom 
behind summer fans, think of all this ? It only sighed prettily, and 
itched the more to know all. Fernand's story was an exciting one so 
far, but society is never wholly satisfied unless it sees the green curtain 
fall on a tragedy on which it has seen it rise. For the rest, it had been 
told that he remained shut up in his rooms and had been seen by no 
one but the doctor and Confianza. It clamored, however, for the end. 
Somehow, this did not come to it so soon as expected. It was very 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 365 

long after Society had retired, so to speak, from the boxes, and the 
lights had been put out, that it heard that Fernand, on the very night 
of the day when the strong oak door was hung on its hinges, had 
passed through it alone. Little by little it came out, that, for that 
particular night, an order had been given to all the slaves of La Quinte, 
somewhat in the fashion of that borne by the herald of Coventry, 

" . . . a thousand summers back." 

The old Indian had taken the message through the house and the 
quarters. " The master is going," she said, " to leave La Quinte to- 
night for his new home. He is very sick and very unhappy. He 
knows that his people love him, and he begs them all to go to their 
cabins early to-night, and not to leave them." 

In the old story of Coventry it was a " shameless noon " that, from 
its hundred toivers, clanged the triumph of a peerless sacrifice. In 
the new one, it was a pitying midnight which, from its hundred shad- 
ows, shrouded the sacrifice of a noble life. La Quinte, fertile as she 
was in sons and daughters, had not bred a " Peeping Tom " among 
them all ; and by nine o'clock there was not one of her children who 
was not abed. 

Fernand had died to the world. So the world, true to its tradi- 
tions, avenged itself by calling his retreat Le Tomheau Blanc, a 
ghoulish fancy, which had received its inspiration from a remark 
accredited to Mme. Diane Dragon (nee Monplaisir), while daintily 
sipping her orgeat, that, " since M. Torres has chosen to bury himself 
alive, his home is well called The White Tomb." For the rest, Society 
had no time for a tragic tale already old. Autumn had laughed with 
Summer over the richness of their common harvest. Winter, which 
had passed in storm over the parish, had found time — there is a deal 
of unrecorded kindly blood in these stern old seasons — to press a part- 
ing kiss upon Spring's virgin lips, and to whisper : " Be good, my 
daughter, and spare not thy sweetest blossoms." It scarcely seemed 
cause for wonder, then, that Society should have forgotten the hermit 
as completely as though he lay, indeed, stretched cold and dreamless 
in his last bed. 

As to the leper's actual condition, even the old Indian knew but 
little. He had locked the gate behind him and kept the key with 
him in his cottage. The turn-window remained the only medium of 
communication between them. Before burying himself, Fernand had 
said to her : " You know that I am very sick ; what is worse, I am 
hopeless. My life may be short or long. Whether long or short, I 
am forced to suffer. I wish to die, but it is my duty to live. Cook 
my meals and put them twice a day in the turn-window. I shall call 



366 FICTION. 

for them at eight o'clock in the morning ; then again at four in the 
afternoon." That was all which had passed between the two. It 
seemed a sorry exhibit enough, this gratitude smothered in the fumes 
of a gastronomic edict. But the true old woman took it all to herself, 
and that night, with her worn rosary in hand, she broke into an extra 
plea of Paternosters and Ave Marias. 

In the meantime, and in his bitter solitude, shuddering and sick at 
heart, Fernand would turn from his mournful future to the compensa- 
tion which must be his so long as his skilful hands could win music 
from the strings of his Cremona. This instrument was a gift to him, 
when a lad, from Duffeyte, that brilliant tenor whose sweet notes had 
entranced Creoledom somewhere in the M-0's. His power over his gift 
was not unworthy of the donor. His soul was alive with music as a 
heated forge is with flame. Compositions of the great masters 
weighted his music-rack ; but memories of Verdi and Donizetti, and 
melodies of Liszt and Strauss were with him, and through the chords 
of his Cremona, with an almost human sympathy, spoke tenderly and 
consolingly to the leper's heart. The cool and quiet of midnight were 
wont to fall like a dream of peace upon his tortured soul. He had 
cried with Themistocles, " Give me the art of oblivion ! " But the 
unpitying sun was not his friend. Its torrid glare already revealed 
that fatal whiteness which separated him from his fellows. He felt 
that, for him, the moonlight was better than the sunlight ; and the 
night's black mantle friendlier than the day's blazing shield. In his 
isolation, he learned, too, to acknowledge a comradeship, during the 
short spring and long summer months, with the whippoorwill, that 
sad brown bird of the eijjrriere, which, shunning the haunts of happier 
men, had been won by the mystic shadows and unbroken silence within 
the wall, and had come to grieve with him through moonlit nights, 
coyly hidden, but fearless, among the leaves of the ancient oak. 

For in the meantime, Dr. Tousage's judgment had been verified. 

Fernand's leprosy was already developed when he fought the flames 
at Beaumanoir. But when Spring came, in memory of her agreement 
with Father Winter to drop blossoms on the trees and to fill the 
black earth with flowers, the second stage was already reached. It 
was to the credit of the doctor's sincere friendship that not a whisper 
of this was breathed beyond the old woman's hut. But the fight 
was held within the wall and under Pere Chene, all the while. The 
old physician's visits were for a time regular. Then, all at once, his 
knock ceased to be heard at the oak door. Something had taken 
place between the two — a quarrel, everybody said. Oh, no ! not that ; 
only a bit of truth from Science, told in a broken voice, and with great 
tears streaming down from under the gold spectacles of the leech : 



LE TO 31 BEAU BLANC. 367 

" I can no longer hope to do you good, Fernand, and I may pos- 
sibly injure others by my visits. The physician does not belong to 
himself. Your disease, always incurable, has within the last six 
months become practically contagious. God bless you, my son, and 
give you courage to bear unto the end." 

This was, for Fernand, a dismissal that had long been foreseen. 
There was death in his heart already, and all that he asked was that 
he might indeed cease to live, and be at rest forever. But of what he 
suffered, and of the storm that, raging in him, broke out in bitter rain, 
all this the great wall hid, as a new and sadder secret, among the 
branches of its monster oak. 

When Dr. Tousage left him, Fernand was righting with the second 
stage of his disease. The arbutus-like pink of his complexion had 
faded out. He had become a " leper white as snow." He saw before 
him a Calvary on whose via dolorosa he could hope to meet no Cyre- 
nian to bear his cross. He found himself thinking of a time when the 
white skin would change into a coarse yellow ; when deep into its sur- 
face a growth of tubercles would fatten in ulcerous corruption ; when 
the hand that had grown so warm in love might lose the use of its 
shapely fingers ; and when even the face hallowed by the first and last 
kiss of Blanche, might, if seen in its awful disfigurement, come to 
frighten timid women in mother's labor. He knew himself to be like 
another Vivenzio in the castle of Tolfi. His own life, in its decaying 
physical form, measured for him as surely the year-posts to death as 
the lessening windows of his iron shroud had for the Italian. 

Behind his wall, perhaps in a bitter spirit, perhaps in resignation,, 
he had gauged the world and believed it wanting in remembrance. 
But he was not forgotten. Old Confianza, at his window, sat day and 
night, as silently and faithfully watching as Mordecai at the Persian's 
gate. And there were others. In those dark hours dear to him, there 
were passers-by along the bayou-road. These were men and women 
who had learned to make that road a Mecca, because they had loved 
the kindly man now forced to live a pariah. 

The road seemed haunted with ghosts. 

For, as the darkness fell upon bayou and swamp, shadows would 
come stepping softly out of it to mass a moment in fearful silence in 
front of Le Tombeau Blanc • to point out, each to his neighbor, the 
great ghostly wall, and to raise their black hands in whispered bless- 
ing over it ; and then, as their creeping-off would drop into a half -trot, 
they would break out into a wild hymn, which, beginning soft and 
tremulous, would grow into loudness, drowning the whippoorwill's 
plaint, and filling the woods with the presence of an uncultured but 
mighty miserere. 



368 FICTION. 

Following these ghosts, but avoiding always to meet them, would 
come others. These would creep from the forest depths lower down, 
stand for a longer time than the rest staring at the wall ; would raise 
their hands, too, in silent benediction, and, in their turn, retire as 
noiselessly as the shadows that they were. Lepers in body, the souls of 
these ghosts were clean. For out of the agony that was Selfishness 
had bloomed the flower that was Gratitude. 

But, after a time, these loving ghosts left the bayou-road to its 
loneliness. Then a ghost, gaunt and tall, assuming a woman's shape, 
would step out into the road and stand, looking up with patient sad- 
ness. This shape would appear so suddenly after the lepers' flitting 
that it was clear it had been lying in wait. 

Then a special phantom, also a ivoman, with strange black robes 
floating around her, would glide quickly in front of the wall, stop, 
clasp its hands wildly, with face upturned toward it, as though in sup- 
plication ; lower its head, with hands still clasped, into the dust of the 
road, to pray and weep, and weep and pray again. 

After a while, the first ghost would draw near, gently touch the 
shoulder of the kneeling figure, and together both phantoms would 
become lost in the deeper shadows of Confianza's hut. 

Of all these ghosts Fernand knew nothing. 

Fernand was a prisoner for life. But the world outside had not, 
for him or his wall, ceased to move. Action had clutched the scab- 
bard from Argument, and with its right hand drawn the blade. Of 
the war that had drenched the land in blood, he had heard but once. 
Men in blue and men in gray had marched past his wall, awed at its 
height, marvelling at its quaintness, wondering at its use. Then, 
learning its tragic story, the brave men had turned, somehow, a free 
and easy route-step into something suspiciously like a double-quick. 
Confianza herself was mute. A curt order for silence, given by Fer- 
nand in the beginning of his malady, had been loyally obeyed by the 
old Indian ; and by long prohibition, no copy of the Picayune had 
come to tell him that Mars, sword in hand, was sweeping over fields 
of sugar, corn, and cotton. One day — the date thereof is fixed in the 
war annals, not in these pages — a single boom was heard under the 
branches of le Pere Chene. Faintly but distinctly, the boom soon 
came to Fernand's ear — fast, furious, continuous. Evidently a distant 
cannonade. He could not hear the wild yell, nor the great answering 
shout that kept time to its martial challenge. But Battle has a voice 
of its own, and that spoke in the heavy guns of Labadieville. 

" What is that, Confianza % " came hoarsely shouted from the turn- 
window. 

" Son las tropas, Sefior" 



LE TOMB E AU BLANC. 369 

" Troops ! men playing at soldiers, you mean." 

" Oh, no, hi jo mio ! Dey de troops of the Nort and de Sout. Dey 
fight demselves togeder. Ya ees old la guerra." 

Then, with ears alert and eyes distended, she raised herself to listen 
— listening not to the guns, but to a cry that wailed through the 
silence — a cry harsh, sinister, discordant, horrible — a cry that was the 
roar of a wild beast hunted to death in the jungle. 

" My God ! my God ! why cannot I find death among the fighters 
yonder ? " 

This was an episode — not the least ghastly among the episodes of 
that sorrowful time. 

Years had passed since then. The leper seemed to have forgotten 
the day when he had heard from within Le Tombeau Blanc the guns 
of Labadieville. After all, it was time that he should do so. Already 
he thought of himself as a creature like Moore's " bloodless ghost," 
speculating bitterly on the day, sure to dawn, when, chained to his bed, 
he would come to sit by his 

" . . . own pale corpse, watching it." 

Bear in mind that it was through all these years from that night 
at Beaumanoir, through peaceful times, through quiet harvests, through 
gathering clouds, through deep thunderings, through lightning burst- 
ing from those clouds, through a great war, through a noble effort, 
through a mighty liberation, through a peace that was not a calm and 
a calm that became peace, that Fernand had changed from the figure 
of a perfect manhood to what he then was. On the whole, his dread 
disease had been merciful to him. The muscles, once firm as Samson's, 
had long since betrayed their strength into eating ulcers. But Gan- 
grene — Death's grimmest lieutenant — still refrained from striking. It 
hovered with its scythe over the feet, filled with a growth of pustules. 
It threatened those hands once so strong, so soft, as instinct with 
music as with daring ; but ten fingers still remained to be counted 
between them. His voice had become rauque and broken ; but the 
hair, beard, and eye-brows, although prematurely white, had not yet 
dropped from their follicles. His features were enlarged, had turned 
to ghastly grotesqueness, but so far they had escaped the teredo-like 
borings of leprosy. With all this, he felt himself growing weaker day 
hy day. He had ceased to use Dr. Tousage's medicines, left at inter- 
vals on his window. He could have no faith whatsoever in the phy- 
sician who had none in himself, and who had told him frankly : 
" Palliatives, not remedies, Fernand, these are all I can promise you." 
But even these were now beyond his reach — the good old doctor had 
written his last prescription. 
24 



370 FICTION. 

Little by little, Fernand yielded his consolations. A fine dust, 
settling around the strings of Duffeyte's Cremona, had clogged their 
melody. Of the wild-beast-like, circular paths around and about the 
Tombeau, no sign remained. The grass had grown thick over them, as 
well as over that which, night after night, had so long been his road 
in the old days, to the lowest rung of a ladder by which he had reached 
the summit of the great solemn wall, and where, condemned like Moses 
on Pisgah's height, he would direct yearning glances " westward and 
northward, and southward and eastward," toward the black waters of 
the bayou swirling by in the darkness, and the shadowy outlines of 
fertile fields, once his own, and of dark forests which had been his 
hunting-ground as boy and man. 

There is now but one path in the Tomheau Blanc. It was the 
leper's first, as it will be his last path — the walk which leads from the 
cottage to the turn- window, which holds, each morning and afternoon, 
his food and drink. 

There are two parts fairly mixed in our humanity when in extrem- 
ity. One is animal ; the other, spiritual. The two cannot live apart, 
so long as the body itself holds together. Fernand feels this keenly. 
He seeks his food, as a beast, maimed in the fierce wars of its kind, 
might crawl to seek it — by habit. But unlike the beast, his spirit, 
which stands for his pleasures, is confined to his cottage, or, in fair 
sunny weather, to his seat under the Father Oak. He can no longer 
find solace in his Cremona. He can no longer see to read. He can 
only — think, think, think ! He totters, while he keeps back the groans, 
as he now makes the daily trips for food. He remembers how, years, 
years ago, he had firmly planted his feet on that well-beaten path, 
hopeless then, but self -poised. Now, he can only creep painfully along 
it, stopping at intervals to gasp, taking a half-hour where once the 
half-minute had sufficed. Then, he had clutched his food with the 
appetite which young manhood gives, even when it knows itself 
doomed to lingering disease. ISTow, he puts his hand up for it with 
loathing, and turns aside with a shudder when he draws it down. 

That terrible path ! This is what he now most fears. His hands 
are not of the strongest for the carrying of food, none of the safest for 
bearing a full pitcher. For over their swollen surface the skin has 
thickened and stretched tight and hard like a drum's head. His fingers 
are gradually turning within like a harpy's claws. He is far from sure 
of them. One day he doubts whether they will be able to take the 
food without dropping it. The next day he fears that they cannot 
carry drink without spilling it. The sorrowful truth is that he is 
growing afraid of himself. He trembles as he looks down at his 



LE TOMBEAU BLANC. 371 

pustuled feet, now always bare. At times he holds before his eyes in 
the sunlight his two yellow swollen hands with their curved fingers. 
Then, indeed, he breaks out into sudden despair ; he bows his head 
upon those fingers, blotting out the tell-tale sun, while through them 
trickle the scalding scanty tears which lepers weep. 

He knows that he is now far in the last stage of his disease ; that 
the end of all this must be impotence. The certainty of his fate 
haunts him like a spectre. He has marked with a ? that unknown day, 
soon to come, when he shall be too weak to leave his room. One way 
or other, he feels that that day, when it does come, must break the 
self-will which has grown almost marble under the Pere Ohene. The 
Church has taught him that suicide is a crime. Though in a tomb, 
whence he can neither see the blaze of altar-candles, nor hear the 
chimes in steeple-bells, he believes it from his soul to be one. He is 
utterly alone in these days. Even Nature, the tried ally of solitary 
man, has neglected, if it have not altogether forgotten him. For 
years, that wizard of the forest, the mocking-bird, has cheered him 
with its " lyric bursts " of unmatched melody. But, true to its own 
instincts, it has set up its throne in the thickets around Confianza's hut. 
Outside of, not within, the gloomy Avail is where the singer chooses 
to reign ; and there it reigns, day and night, content if it only knows 
that the leper within gains from its wondrous notes a single hope. 
Fernand does not doubt his consoler, I think ; or, if he do, his is only 
the faint shadow of a fainter doubt. Both were bred in the land of the 
orange and the sugar-cane. In the man's philosophy, born of his old 
nurse's lullabies, a certain sorcery attaches to this wondrous bird of 
wondrous song. As he listens in his agony to its joyous bursts, he so 
bound, it so free, he murmurs half unconsciously, in the wild words of 
an old Creole hymn of Nature, caught breathing from her by Pere 
Rouquette : 

" Ah, mokeur ! Ah, mokeur shanteur ! 
Ah, ah ! to gagnin giab dan kor ! 
To gagnin tro l'espri, mokeur. 

MS, shantg : m'a koute" ankor ! " * 

Thus, in its own fashion, is the gray maestro faithful to him. But 
not so his old shy comrade, the whippoorwill, which has long since 
left the tree that, in its depths, it haunted, and the master whom, in 
its coyness, it had seemed to love. The cypriere has sent none other 

* Ah, mocking-bird ! Ah, mocking songster ! 
Ah, thou hast the devil in thy heart ! 
Thou hast too much wit, mocking-bird. 
But sing on ; I must listen — once more ! 



372 FICTION. 

of its songsters ; and even the little twittering birds, that dote on free- 
dom and space and glitter and company, avoid the mournful Father 
Oak as though he were a plague. Or, perhaps, these tiny creatures 
have finer senses than man, and know of the plague that sits and 
ponders, a breathing corpse, under the grand old tree. 

Here it is that Fernand passes hours in figuring over and over 
again what will come of the inevitable invasion. Confianza must, of 
course, be admitted. And Blanche ? Oh, would that she could ! But 
how foolish all this is, none knows so well as he. He would not let his 
darling in, no ! not were she even to knock at the gate and ask that it 
be opened unto her. Nor can Blanche — but I had forgotten, there is 
no longer a Blanche. 

There is a Sceur Angelique who once bore her name — a fair and 
sinless woman dedicated to God, of whom her black-robed sisters speak 
with love and pride. Nothing of all this passes into the Tombeau 
Blanc. Fernand has not forgotten Blanche, but he has no knowledge 
of SiBur Angelique. He is ever intent upon the old problems that vex 
his waning life. The great iron-bound door, so long closed, must soon 
turn upon its rusty hinges. Who will dare pass the gate ? Who will, 
having once passed it, dare advance to confront the odor of the char- 
nel-house which fills the square, and which seems to have blasted the 
green old age of le Pere Chene f Who % 

The world % No ! 

His old doctor 3 No ! 

His former slaves ? No ! 

Delegates from Leper-Land ? Yes ! 

Forgetf ulness forbids the first ; death, the second ; superstition and 
" exodus," the third ; brotherhood admits the last. 

At this prospect, leper as he is, he shudders. 

These fancies fill his dark hours. He keeps his failing e}^es fastened 
wearily upon his narrow domain. The grass is growing thick and 
green over all the paths which he once circled in his madness. It is 
with eager longing he awaits the day when it shall spring up as thick 
and green around and over his last walk. 

" It took years to cover those," he murmurs hoarsely. " My God ! 
how many weeks will it be before this last one is covered ? " 



December 25, 187- A letter just received from my friend, the 
Mayor of Thibodaux, contains this simple announcement : 
" Death, the Consoler, has at last come to Fernand" 



THE BANQUET. 

BY ALFRED MERCIEE. 

[Alfred Mercier was born at McDonogh, La., June 3, 1816. In his fourteenth 
year he was sent to France to be educated. In 1842 he published, at Paris, a volume 
of poems, the principal of which were La Rose de Smyme, and UErmite de Niagara, 
which were highly praised in the Revue de Paris. He devoted the next few years, 
during extensive travels in Europe, to the philosophic study of men and things. In 
1848 he wrote a romance for La Reforme, a prominent literary journal of the day. On 
the morning that the first feuilleton was to appear, the commune broke into the office 
and " pied " the forms. This was a blow to the young author. Originally intended 
for the bar, his tastes led him into literature ; but republican France making small 
account of letters, he suddenly resolved to study medicine. After he was graduated in 
that science, he practised his profession for three years in New Orleans. In 1859 he 
returned to France, remaining there until the close of our civil war, when he finally 
returned to New Orleans. His works of fiction include Le Fou de Palerme (1873); 
La Fille du Pretre (1877); L' Habitation St. Ybars (1881); Lidia (1888); and Johnelle 
(1891). Dr. Mercier possesses a delicate fancy, and a style at once virile and pictur- 
esque. 

I. 

Night was approaching. 

A laborer, heavily laden, was slowly ascending a mountain ; ex- 
hausted by the weight he carried, he sat upon a rock near the road, 
and sighing deeply, said : 

" How unfortunate I am ! After so many years of relentless toil, 
I can scarcely provide the necessaries of life for my family. I know 
I am strong still ; but I am continually tormented by the fear of 
what the future has in store for us ; and the thought that I may die, 
leaving my wife and children penniless, makes me shudder. That fear 
tortures me, and poisons the very well-spring of my happiness." 

Such were the laborer's lamentations. 

He bent his head to his chest ; the fever of weariness seized him. 
and he fell half -asleep, while his thoughts unconsciously wandered in 
the indefinite land of dreams. 

He felt himself uplifted and transported far away. 

Suddenly he was seated at an immense banquet, in a hall dazzling 
with lights and gold. The table, surrounded by guests, extended 
itself from the rising to the setting of the sun, and there he saw 
people of every description ; men and women, young and old, children, 
kings and queens, ferocious-looking soldiers, diplomats with astute 



374 FICTION. 

smiles, beggars in rags, sailors, priests, pale nuns, laborers, courtiers, 
and suspicious-looking gentry ; in short, people from every tribe, 
race, and country ; some nearly naked, others covered with silks and 
precious stones. 

Looking at his right, the dreamer recognized his wife and son ; at 
his left were his daughters, surrounded by young men who addressed 
them in pure and loving language. 

Waiters, crowned with myrtles and roses, went from one guest to 
the other, giving to each a drink that not only was palatable, but 
also had the property of reviving. 

Opposite the laborer one could see a large gallery, on the top of 
which stairs of black marble rested, and their upper portions were 
lost in the skies. 

II. 

From the summit of the stairs came a Spectre that was veiled and 
robed in white. 

And the Spectre, approaching a king who was speaking to his 
ministers about his plans of war, touched him with the tip of its 
fingers. 

The king rose, went on the gallery, ascended the stairs, and re- 
turned not. 

And the Spectre touched two lovers in the act of taking their 
betrothal kiss. 

The lovers left the table and disappeared forever. 

A miser had just won an enormous amount of gold, and knew not 
how to take it all with him ; the Spectre stopped and made a sign to 
him. 

Astonished and trembling, the miser obeyed. As he walked, his 
gold dropped from his pockets to the resounding floor; he would 
have stopped, but could not, and vanished like a vapor that leaves 
naught to detect it. 

Then the Spectre with its right hand drew a great circle around a 
group of happy children, who were listening to the tales of an octo- 
genarian. 

The aged man directed his steps towards the mysterious hall ; the 
children followed playfully. 

A mathematician of universal renown was calculating the chances 
of the future and promising a long career to several capitalists, who 
wondered at his knowledge ; he did not heed an old hag, who also 
wanted to know how long she had to live. 

Looking around suddenly, as if they heard some one call them, the 
capitalists saw the Spectre shaking its head in the affirmative. 



/ 



THE BANQUET. 375 

Surprised and frightened, they left the table, and their friends 
waited for them in vain. 

Two young men rose, each with a cup in his hand. Joy and love 
were depicted on the one's face ; the other looked very sad. 

Said the former : " Let us enjoy life ! Here's to my mistress— and 
to the happy days we have before us ! " 

Said the latter : " Happiness is a lie ; the spring of my life has 
brought me but bitter delusions. I empty this cup as a farewell to 
every vain hope ! " 

But the youths did not have time to drink ; the cups slipped from 
their fingers without the loss of a single drop of wine ; and suspended 
in the air, like feathers carried by the wind, were wafted towards the 
hall. The Spectre commanded the two young men to follow, and 
they departed, as the others had previously done, forever. 

III. 

The laborer became frightened. Wildly clasping his arms around 
his wife and children, he pressed them to his heart. 

New guests took the place of departed ones. The meats and 
drinks were always renewed, and the banquet always continued. 

Time tied rapidly, and the dreamer's hair had whitened. It seemed 
to him that he had reached life's last degree, and that his daughters, 
who had borne children several times, smiled on him ; while hfs ao-ed 
wife leaned on her grandson's arm. 

And when the Spectre approached him at last, he fearlesslv rose 
and said : 

u I am ready. Now I understand what is meant. The banquet 
is Life ; and thou art Fate's messenger, that calls each of us at his 
turn. We must neither rely on, nor despair of, the morrow. Young 
or old, happy or unhappy, Ave all obey thy mandates ; and man should 
live in peace with himself, and take calmly what every day brings. 

" Hail to thee, O Death ! Thou commandest that I leave this 
banquet, which I have attended longer than I should have expected. 
I go cheerfully. I have carried my burden without complaint, and I 
deposit it without regret." 

IV. 

The sleeper opened his eyes and stood up. His courage was 
revived by what he had seen. He resumed his ascent of the moun- 
tain, and, by the sweet light of the stars, reached his modest home, 
where his wife and children awaited him for the evening meal. 

Translated from the French. 



THE DEVOTION OF MAKC^LITE.* 

BY GRACE KING. 

[Grace Elizabeth King, novelist and historian, the daughter of the distinguished 
Louisiana lawyer, the late William W. King, is a native of New Orleans. She was 
educated, for the most part, in the Creole schools of her native city, where she has- 
always been domiciled. Speaking of her ability as a novelist, Mr. Coleman, the well- 
known critic, says : "There is in her delineation of character no element of exaggera- 
tion, but simply a faithful presentation of the impulsive Southern temperament instinct 
with the warmth of the Southern sun." She is a frequent contributor to the various 
Northern magazines, and is the author of Bonne Maman, a novelette (1886); Monsieur 
Motte, a novel (1888); Earthlings, a novel (1889); and Bienville, a life of the first 
Governor of Louisiana (1892). She is also the joint author, with Professor John R. 
Ficklen, of A History of Louisiana (1893).] 

The Externes were radiant in toilettes unmarred by accident or 
omission ; the flattering compliments of their mirrors at home had 
turned their heads in the direction of perfect self-content. Kesigna- 
tion was the only equivalent the unfortunate Internes could offer in 
extenuation of the unfinished appearance of their heads. 

" Mais, dis done, chere, what is the matter with your hair ? " 

" Marcelite did not come." 

"Why, do u •douce, how could you allow your hair to be combed 
that way ? " 

" Marcelite did not come." 

" Cherie, I think your hair is curled a little tight this evening." 

" I should think so ; that diable Marcelite did not come." 

" Mon Dieu, look at Madame Joubert a la sauvagesse ! " 

" And Madame a la grand ''maman ! " 

" Marcelite did not come, you see." 

Not only was the room filled, but an eager audience crowded the 
yard and peeped in through the windows. The stairways, of course, 
were filled with the colored servants, an enthusiastic, irrepressible 
claque. When it was all over, and the last bis and encore had subsided, 
row after row of girls was gleaned by the parents, proud possessors of 
such shawlfuls of beauty, talent, and prizes. Marie's class, the last 
to leave, were picked off one by one. She helped the others to put on 
their wraps, gather up their prizes, and kissed one after another 
good-by. 

* [From Monsieur Motte, 1888.] 



THE DEVOTION OF MARC ELITE. 3^7 

Each man that came up was, by a glance, measured and compared 
with her imaginary standard. " He is too young." " He is too fat." 
" I hope he is not that cross-looking one." " Maybe it is he." " What 
a funny little one that is ! " " Ah, he is very nice-looking ! " " Is it 
he?" "No, he is Corinne's father." "I feel sure he is that ugly, 
disagreeable one." " Ah, here he is at last ! at last ! " " No ; he only 
came to say good-night to Madame." " He is afraid of the crowd." 
" He is waiting outside." " He is at the gate in a carriage." " After 
all, he has only sent Marcelite." " I saw her here on the steps a while 
ago." She looked at the steps ; they were deserted. There was but 
one person left in the room besides herself; Madame and her suite 
had gone to partake of their yearly exhibitional refreshments— lem- 
onade and inasse-pain, served in the little parlor. Her uncle must be 
that man. The person walked out after finding a fan he had returned 
to seek. 

She remained standing so by the piano a long while, her gold 
crown on her head, her prizes in her arms, and a light shawl she had 
thoughtfully provided to wear home. Home ! She looked all around 
very slowly once more. She heard Jeanne crossing the yard, but 
before the servant could enter the door, the white muslin dress, blue 
sash, and satin boots had bounded into the darkness of the stairway. 
The white-veiled beds which the night before had nestled the gay 
papillotted heads were deserted and silent in the darkness. What a 
shelter the darkness was ! She caught hold of the bedpost, not think- 
ing, but feeling. Then Madame Joubert came tripping across the 
gallery with a candle, on her way to bed. The prizes and shawl 
dropped to the floor, and Marie crouched down close behind the bar. 
" O God," she prayed, " keep her from seeing me ! " The teacher, 
after a pause of reflection, passed on to her room ; the child on the 
floor gave herself up to the full grief of a disappointment Avhich was 
not childish in its bitterness. The events of the evening kept slipping 
away from her while the contents of her previous life were poured out 
with never-ending detail ; and as they lay there, before and all around 
her, she saw for the first time how bare, how denuded of pleasure and 
comfort it had been. What had her weak little body not endured in 
patient ignorance ? But the others were not ignorant, — the teachers, 
Marcelite, her uncle ! How had they imposed upon the orphan in 
their hands ! She saw it now, and she felt a woman's indignation and 
pity over it. The maternal instinct in her bosom was roused by the 
contemplation of her own infancy. "Marcelite! Marcelite!'' she 
called out, " how could you ? For you knew, you knew it all ! " The 
thought of a mother compelled to leave her baby on such an earth, 
the betrayal of the confidence of her own mother by her uncle, drew 



378 FICTION. 

the first tears from her eyes. She leaned her head against the side of 
her bed and wept, not for herself, but for all women and all orphans. 
Her hand fell on the lace of her dress, and she could not recall at first 
what it was. She bounded up, and with eager, trembling fingers 
tearing open the fastenings, she threw the grotesque masquerade, 
boots and all, far from her on the floor, and stood clasping her naked 
arms over her panting breast ; she had forgotten the gilt wreath on her 
head. " If she could die then and there ! That would hurt her uncle 
who cared so little for her, Marcelite who had deserted her ! " Living, 
she had no one ; but dead, she felt she had a mother. Before getting 
into bed, she mechanically fell on her knees, and her lips repeated the 
formula of a prayer, an uncorrected, rude tradition of her baby days, 
belonging to the other side of her memory. It consisted of one simple 
petition for her own welfare ; but the blessings of peace, prosperity, and 
eternal salvation of her uncle and Marcelite were insisted upon with 
pious determination. 

" I know I shall not sleep, I cannot sleep." Even with the words 
she sank into the oblivion of tired nature at seventeen years ; an ob- 
livion which blotted out everything— toilette, prizes scattered on the 
floor, graduation, disappointment, and discomfort from the gilt paper 
crown still encircling her black plaits. 

" Has Marcelite come ? " demanded Madame, before she tasted her 
coffee. 

" Not yet, Madame." 

" I wonder what has become of her ? " 

Jeanne sniffed a volume of unspeakable probabilities. 

" Well, then, I will not have that sotte Julie ; tell her so when she 
comes. I would rather dress myself." 

"Will Madame take her breakfast alone, or with Madame Jou- 
bert 3 " 

The pleasure of vacation was tempered by the companionship of 
Madame Joubert at her daily meals — a presence imposed by that 
stern tyrant, common courtesy. 

" Not to-day, Jeanne ; tell Madame Joubert I have la 'migraine. I 
shall eat breakfast alone." 

" And Mamzelle Marie Modeste ? " 

" Marie Modeste ! " 

" Yes, Madame ; where must she take her breakfast ? " 

The Gasconne's eyes flamed suddenly from under her red lashes, and 
her voice ventured on its normal loud tones in these sacred precincts. 

" It's a shame of that negress ! She ought to be punished well for 
it, too, ha ! Not to come for that poor young lady last night ; to leave 



THE DEVOTION OF MARCELITE. 379 

lier in that big dormitory all by herself ; and all the other young 
ladies to go home and have their pleasure, and she all by herself — just 
because she is an orphan. You think she doesn't feel that, hem ? If 
I had known it, I would have helped her undress, and stayed with her, 
too ; I would have slept on the floor. A delicate little nervous thing 
like that ; and a great big, fat, lazy, good-for-nothing quadroon like 
Marcelite. Mais c'est infdme ! It is enough to give her des crises. 
Oh, I would not have done that ! — tenez, not to go back to France 
would I have done that. And when I got up this morning, and saw 
her sitting in the arbor, so pale, I was frightened myself — I " — 

" "What is all this you are telling me % Jeanne, Jeanne, go immedi- 
ately ; run, I tell you — run and fetch that poor child here. Ah, mon 
Dieu ! egoist that I am to forget her ! Pay/ore petite chatte ! What 
must she think of me ? " 

She jumped out of bed, threw on a wrapper, and waited at the 
door T peeping out. 

" Mafille, I did not know — Jeanne has just told me." 

The pale little figure made an effort to answer with the old pride 
and indifference. 

" It seems my uncle " — 

" Mais qiCest-ce que c'est done, mon enfant ? Do not cry so ! What 
is one night more in your old school ? It is all my fault ; the idea 
that I should forget yOu — leave you all alone while we were enjoying 
our lemonade and masse-pain ! But why did you not come to me ? 
Oh, oh ! if you cry so, I shall think you are sorry not to leave me ! 
Besides, it wall spoil your pretty eyes." 

" If Marcelite had only come " — 

" Ah, my dear, do not speak of her ; do not mention her name to 
me ! We are quittes from this day ; you hear me ? We are quittes. 
But, Marie, my child, you will make yourself ill if you cry so. Really, 
you must try and compose yourself. What is it that troubles you so % 
Come here, come sit by me ; let me confess you. I shall play that I 
am your maman. There, there, put your head here, my hebe, so. Oh, 
I know how you feel ! I have known what disappointment was. But 
enfin, my child, that will all pass ; and one day, when you are old and 
gray -headed like me, you will laugh well over it." 

The tender words, the caresses, the enfolding arms, the tears that 
she saw standing in the august schoolmistress's eyes, the sympathetic 
movement of the soft, warm bosom — her idea of a mother was not a 
vain imagining. This was it ; this was what she had longed for all 
her life. And she did confess to her — confessed it all, from the first 
childish trouble to the last disappointment. Oh, the delicious relief of 
complete, entire confession to a sympathetic ear ! 



e 



380 FICTION. 

The noble heart of Madame, which had frittered itself away over 
puny distributions of prizes and deceiving cosmetics, beat young, 
fresh, and impulsive as in the days when the gray hairs were chatains 
clair, and the cheeks bloomed natural roses. Tears fell from her eyes 
on the little black head lying so truthful, so confiding on her bosom. 
Grand Dieu ! and they had been living thirteen years under the same 
roof — the poor, insignificant, abandoned, suffering little Marie, and 
the gay, beautiful, rich, envied Madame Lareveillere ! This was their 
first moment of confidence. Would God ever forgive her? Could 
she ever forgive herself ? How good it feels to have a child in your 
arms — so ! She went to the stand by her bed and filled a small gilded 
glass with earn des capmes and water. 

" There, drink that, my child ; it will compose you. I must make 
my toilette; it is breakfast time. You see, majllle, this is a lesson. 
You must not expect too much of the men ; they are not like us. Oh, 
I know them well ! They are all egoisies. They take a great deal of 
trouble for you when you do not want it, if it suits them ; and then 
they refuse to raise their little finger for you, though you get down 
on your knees to them. Now, there's your uncle. You see he has 
sent you to the best and most expensive school in the city, and he has 
dressed you well — oh, yes, very well ! Look at your toilette last night ! 
— real lace ; I remarked it. Yet he would not come for you and take 
you home, and spare you this disappointment. I wrote him a note 
myself and sent it by Marcelite." 

" He is old, Madame," said Marie, loyally. 

" Ah, bah ! Plus les hommes sont vieux plus Us sont mechants. Oh,, 
I have done that so often ! I said, ' If you do not do this, I will not do 
that.' And what was the result i They did not do this, and I had 
tout simplement et honnement to do that. I write to Monsieur Motte, 
' Your niece shall not leave the Pension until you come for her.' He 
does not come, and I take her to him. Voild la politique feminine." 

After breakfast, when they had dressed, bonneted, and gloved 
themselves, Madame said : 

" Ma foi ! I do not even know where the old Diogene lives. Do 
you remember the name of the street, Marie \ " 

" No, Madame ; somewhere in the Faubourg d'en has." 

" Ah, well ! I must look for it here." 

She went to the table and quickly turned over the leaves of a- 
ledger. 

" Marie Modeste Motte, niece of Monsieur Motte. Mais, tiens y 
there is no address ! " 

Marie looked with interest at her name written in red ink. 

" No ; it is not there." 



THE DEVOTION OF 3IARCELITE. 381 

" A h, que je suis bete! It is in the other one. This one is only for 
the last ten years. There, ma fille, get on a chair. Can you reach that 
one ? No, not that, the other one. How warm it is ! You look it 
out for me." 

" I do not see any address here either, Madame." 
"Impossible! There must be an address there. True, nothing 
but Marie Modeste Motte, niece of Monsieur Motte, just like the other 
one. Now, you see, that's Marcelite again ; that's all her fault. It 
was her duty to give that address thirteen years ago. In thirteen 
years she has not had the time to do that." 
They both sat down, warm and vexed. 
" I shall send Jeanne for her again." 
But Jeanne's zeal had anticipated orders. 

" I have already been there, Madame. I beat on her door, I beat 
on it as hard as I could; and the neighbors opened their windows 
and said they didn't think she had been there all night." 

" Well, then, there is nothing for me to do but send for Monsieur 
le Notaire. Here, Jeanne, take this note to Monsieur Goupilleau." 

All unmarried women, widows or maids, if put to the torture, 
would reveal some secret, unsuspected sources of advisory assistance 
— a subterranean passage for friendship which sometimes oifers a 
retreat into matrimony— and the last possible wrinkle, the last resist- 
ing gray hair is added to other female burdens at the death, of this 
secret counsellor or the closing up of the hidden passage. Therefore, 
how dreadful it is for women to be condemned to a life of such logical 
exactions where a reason is demanded for everything, even for a statu 
quo affection of fifteen years or more. Madame Lareveillere did not 
possess courage enough to defy logic, but her imagination and wit 
could seriously embarrass its conclusions. The raison d'etre of a Gou- 
pilleau in her life had exercised both into athletic proportions. 

" An old friend, ma mignonne ; I look upon him as a father, and 
he treats me just as if I were his daughter. I go to him as to a con- 
fessor. And a great institute like this requires so much advice— oh, 
so much ! He is very old— as old as Monsieur Motte himself. We 
might just as well take off our things ; he will not come before even- 
ing. You see, he is so discreet, he would not come in the morning for 
anything in the world. He is just exactly like a father, I assure you, 
and very, very old." 

The graduate and young lady of a day sat in the rocking-chair, 
quiet, almost happy. She was not in the home she had looked for- 
ward to ; but Madame's tenderness, the beautiful room in its soothing 
twilight, and the patronizing majesty of the lit de justice made this a 
very pleasant abiding place in her journey— the journey so long and 



382 FICTION. 

so difficult from school to her real home, from girlhood to real young- 
ladyhood. It was nearly two days now since she had seen Marcelite. 
Hoav she longed for her, and what a scolding she intended to give 
her when she arrived at her uncle's, where, of course, Marcelite was 
waiting for her. How silly she had acted about the address ! But, 
after all, procrastination is so natural. As for Madame, Marie smiled 
as she thought how easily a reconciliation could be effected between 
them, quittes though they were. 

It is hard to wean young hearts from hoping and planning ; they 
will do it in the very presence of the angel of death, and with their 
shrouds in full view. 

Monsieur Goupilleau came — a Frenchman of small stature but large 
head. He had the eyes of a poet and the smile of a woman. 

The prelude of compliments, the tentative flourish to determine in 
which key the ensuing variation on their little romance should be 
played, was omitted. Madame came brusquely to the motif, not per- 
sonal to either of them. 

" Monsieur Goupilleau, I take pleasure in presenting you to Made- 
moiselle Marie Motte, one of our young lady graduates. Hon ami, 
we are in the greatest trouble imaginable. Just imagine, Monsieur 
Motte, the uncle of mademoiselle, could not come for her last night to 
take her home. He is so old and infirm,*" added Madame, consider- 
ately ; " so you see mademoiselle could not leave last night. I want to 
take her home myself — a great pleasure it is, and not a trouble, I 
assure you, Marie — but we do not know where he lives." 

" Ah, you have not his address ! " 

" No ; it should be in the ledger ; but an accident — in fact, the lazi- 
ness of her bonne, who never brought it, not once in thirteen years." 

" Her bonne f " 

" Yes, her bonne Marcelite ; you know Marcelite la eoiffeuse. 
What, you do not know Marcelite, that great fat " — 

" Does Marcelite know where he lives ? " 

" But of course, my friend, Marcelite knows ; she goes there every 
day." 

" "Well, send for Marcelite." 

" Send for Marcelite ! But I have sent for Marcelite at least a dozen 
times ! She is never at her room. Marcelite ! ha, my friend, I am 
done with Marcelite ! What do you think ? After combing my hair 
for fifteen years — fifteen years, I tell you — she did not come yester- 
day at all, not once ; and the concert at night ! You should have seen 
our heads last night ! We were frights — frights, I assure you ! " 

It was a poetical license, but the eyes of Monsieur Goupilleau dis- 
claimed any such possibility for the head before him. 



THE DEVOTION OF MAECELITE. 383 

" Does not mademoiselle know the address of her uncle ? " 
" Ah, thai, no. Mademoiselle has been a pensionnaire at the In- 
stitut St. Denis for thirteen years, and she has never been anywhere 
except to church ; she has seen no one without a chaperon ; she has 
received no letter that has not passed through Madame Joubert's 
hands. Ah ! for that I am particular, and it was Monsieur Motte him- 
self who requested it." 

" Then you need a directory." 
" A what ? " 
" A directory." 

" But what is that — a directory ? " 

" It's a volume, Madame, a book containing the addresses of all the 
residents of the city." 

" Quelle bonne idee ! If I had only known that ! I shall buy one 
Jeanne ! Jeanne ! run quick, ma bonne, to Morel's and buy me a 
directory." 

" Pardon, Madame, I think it would be quicker to send to Bale's 
the pharmacien at the corner, and borrow one.— Here, Jeanne take my 
card." J 

" A la bonne heure ! now we shall find our affair." 

But the M's, which started so many names in the directory were 

perfectly innocent of any combination applicable to an old uncle by 

the name of Motte. 

" You see, your directory is no better than my books ! " 

Monsieur Goupilleau looked mortified, and shrugged his shoulders 

" He must live outside the city limits, Madame." 

" Marcelite always said, ' in the Faubourg cVen bas.' " 

Jeanne interrupted stolidly, " Monsieur Bale told me to bring the 

book right back ; it is against his rules to lend it out of his store " 
" Here, take it ! take it ! Tell him I am infinitely obliged. It was- 

of no use, anyway. Ah, les hommes ! " 

"Madame," began Monsieur Goupilleau, in precautionary depre- 
cation. 

A sudden noise outside— apparently an assault at the front door ■ 
a violent struggle in the ante-chamber. 

" Grand Dieu ! what can that be ? " Madame's lips opened for a 
shrill Au secours ! Voleurs ! but seeing the notary rush to the door 
she held him fast with her two little white hands on his arm. 

" Mon ami, I implore you ! " 

The first recognition ; the first expression of a fifteen years' secret 
affection ! The first thrill (old as he was) of his first passion ! But 
danger called him outside; he unloosed the hands and opened the 
door. 



384 • FICTION. 

A heavy body, propelled by Jeanne's strong hands, fell on the 
floor of the room, accompanied by a shower of leaves from Monsieur 
Bale's directory. 

" Miserable! Infdme! EffronUe! Ah, I have caught you % SceU- 
rate ! " 

" Marcelite ! " 

" Marcelite ! " 

" Marcelite ! " 

" Sneaking outside the gate ! Like an animal ! like a thief ! like a 
dog ! Ha ! I caught you well ! " 

The powerful arms seemed ready again to crush the unresisting 
form rising from the floor. 

" Jeanne, hush ! How dare } 7 ou speak to Marcelite like that ? Oh, 
m a bonne, what is the matter with you? " 

Shaking, trembling, she cowered before them, silent. 

" Ah ! she didn't expect me, la fiere negresse ! Just look at 
her ! " 

They did, in painful, questioning surprise. Was this their own 
clean, neat, brave, honest, handsome Marcelite — this panting, tottering, 
bedraggled Avretch before them, threatening to fall on the floor again, 
not daring to raise even her eyes ? 

" Marcelite ! Marcelite ! who has done this to you ? Tell me, tell 
your MM, Marcelite." 

" Is she drunk '. " whispered Madame to the notary. 

Her tignon had been dragged from her head. Her calico dress, 
torn and defaced, showed her skin in naked streaks. Her black woolly 
hair, always so carefully packed away under her head-kerchief, stood 
in grotesque masses around her face, scratched and bleeding like her 
exposed bosom. She jerked herself violently away from Marie's 
clasp. 

" Send them away ! Send them away ! " she at last said to Mon- 
sieur Goupilleau, in a low, unnatural voice. " I will talk to you, but 
send them all away." 

Madame and Marie immediately obeyed his look ; but outside the 
door Marie stopped firmly. 

" Madame, Marcelite can have nothing to say which I should not 
hear " — 

" Hush ! " Madame put her finger to her lips ; the door was still 
a little open, and the voices came to them. 

Marcelite, from the corner of her bleared eyes, watched them retire, 
and then, with a great heave of her naked chest, she threw herself on 
the floor at the notary's feet. 

" Master ! O master ! Help me ! " 



THE DEVOTION OF MARCELITE. 385 

All the suffering and pathos of a woman's heart were in the tones ; 
all the weakness, dependence, and abandonment, in the words. 

The notary started at the unexpected appeal. His humanity, his 
manhood, his chivalry, answered it. 

"Ma fill e, speak; what can I do for you?" 

He bent over her as she lay before him, and put his thin, white, 
wrinkled hand on her shoulder, where it had burst through her dress. 
His low voice promised the willing devotion of a saviour. 

" But don't tell my bebe, don't let her know. My God ! it will kill 
her ! She's got no uncle — no Monsieur Motte ! It was all a lie. It 
was me — me, a nigger — that sent her to school and paid for her " — 

" You ! Marcelite ! You ! " 

Marcelite jumped up and tried to escape from the room. Monsieur 
Goupilleau quickly advanced before her to the door. 

" You fooled me ! It was you fooled me ! " she screamed to Ma- 
dame. " God will never forgive you for that ! Mv bebe has heard it 
all ! " 

Marie clung to her ; Monsieur Goupilleau caught her by the arm. 

" Marcelite ! It was you — you who sent me to school, who paid 
for me ! And I have no uncle \ " 

Marcelite looked at the notary — a prayer for help. The girl fell 
in a chair and hid her face in her hands. 

" Oh, my God ! I knew it would kill her ! I knew it would ! To 
be supported by a nigger ! " She knelt by the chair. " Speak to me, 
Mamzelle Marie. Speak to me just once! Pardon me, my little 
mistress ! Pardon me ! I did not know what I was doing ; I am only 
a fool nigger, anyhow ! I wanted you to go to the finest school with 
ladies, and — and — oh ! my bebe won't speak to me ; she won't even 
look at me." 

Marie raised her head, put both hands on the nurse's shoulders, 
and looked her straight in the eyes. 

" And that also was all a lie about " — she sank her trembling- voice 
— " about my mother % " 

" That a lie ! That a lie ! 'Fore God in heaven, that was the 
truth ; I swear it. I will kiss the crucifix. What do you take me 
for, Mamzelle Marie ? Tell a lie about " — 

Marie fell back in the chair with a despairing cry. 

" I cannot believe any of it." 

" Monsieur ! Madame ! I swear to you it's the truth ! God in 
heaven knows it is. I wouldn't lie about that — about my poor dead 
young mistress. Monsieur ! Madame ! Tell Miss Marie for me ; can't 
you believe me ? " She shrieked in desperation to Monsieur Goupilleau. 

He came to her unhesitatingly. " I believe you, Marcelite." He 
25 



386 FICTION. 

put his hand again on her shoulder ; his voice faltered, " Poor 
Marcelite ! " 

" God bless you, master ! God bless you for that ! Let me tell you ; 
you believe me when my bebe won't. My young mistress, she died ; 
my young master, he had been killed in the war. My young mistress 
was all alone by herself, with nobody but me, and I didn't take her 
poor little baby out of her arms till she was dead, as she told me. 
Mon bebe, mon bebe ! don't you know that's the truth ? Can't you 
feel that's the truth ? You see that ; she will never speak to me 
again. I knew it ; I told you so. I heard her last night, in that big 
room, all by herself, crying for Marcelite. Marcelite ! my God ! I 
was afraid to go to her, and I was just under a bed. You think that 
didn't most kill me % " She hid her face in her arms, and swayed her 
body back and forth. 

" Marcelite," said Monsieur Goupilleau. The voice of the cham- 
pion trembled, and his eyes glistened with tears at the distress he 
had pledged himself to relieve. " Marcelite, I believe you, my poor 
woman ; I believe you. Tell me the name of the lady, the mother of 
Mademoiselle." 

" Ha ! her name ! I am not ashamed to tell her name before any- 
body. Her name ! I will tell you her name." She sprang to her 
feet. " You ask anybody from the Paroisse St. Jacques if they ever 
heard the name of Mamzelle Marie Modeste Yiel and Monsieur 
Alphonse Motte. That was the name of her mother and her father, 
and I am not ashamed of it that I shouldn't tell, ha ! Yes, and I 
am Marcelite Gaulois, and when my mother was sold out of the 
parish, who took me and brought me up, and made me sleep on the 
foot of her bed, and fed me like her own baby, hein f Mamzelle Marie 
Yiel's mother, and Mamzelle was the other baby ; and she nursed us 
like twins, hein f You ask anybody from the Paroisse St. Jacques. 
They know ; they can tell you." 

Marie stood up. 

" Come, Marcelite, let us go. Madame, Monsieur " — She evi- 
dently struggled to say something else, but she only reiterated, " I 
must go ; we must go. Come, Marcelite, let us go." 

No one would have remarked now that her eyes were too old for 
her face. 

" Go ? My Lord ! Where have you got to go to ? " 

" I want to go home to Marcelite ; I want to go away with her. 
Come, Marcelite, let us go. Oh ! don't you all see I can't stay here 
any longer ? Let me go ! Let me go ! " 

" Go with me ! Go to my home ! A white young lady like you 
go live with a nigger like me ! " 



THE DEVOTION OF MARCELITE. 387 

" Come, Marcelite, please come ; go with me ; I don't want to stay- 
here." 

" You stand there ! You hear that ! Monsieur ! Madame ! You 
hear that ! " 

" Marcelite, I want to go with you ; I want to live with you ; I 
am not too good for that." 

" What ! You don't think you ain't white ! O God ! Strike me 
dead ! " 

She raised her naked arms over her head, imploring destruc- 
tion. 

"Marcelite, majllle, do not forget, I have promised to help you. 
Marcelite, only listen to me a moment. Mademoiselle, do not fear ; 
Mademoiselle shall not leave us. I shall protect her ; I shall be a 
father to her " — 

" And I," said Madame, drawing Marie still closer to her, " I shall 
be her mother." 

" Now, try, Marcelite," continued Monsieur Goupilleau, " try to 
remember somebody, anybody who knows you, who knew your mis- 
tress ; I want their names. Anybody, anybody will do, my poor 
Marcelite ! Indeed, I believe you ; we all believe you ; we know you 
are telling the truth. But is there not a person, even a book, a piece 
of paper, anything, you can remember % " 

He stood close to her ; his head did not reach above her shoulders, 
but his eyes plead into her face as if petitioning for his own honor ; 
and then they followed the hands of the woman fumbling, feeling, 
passing, repassing inside her torn dress-waist. He held his hands out 
• — the kind, tender little hands that had rested so gently on her bruised 
black skin. 

" If I have not lost it, if I have not dropped it out of my gown 
since last night — I never have dropped it, and I have carried it round 
inside my body now for seventeen years ; but I was 'most crazy last 
night " — 

She put a small package all wrapped up in an old bandanna hand- 
kerchief in his hands. 

" I was keeping that for my hebe; I was going to give it to her 
when she graduated, just to remind her of her own mother. She 
gave it to me when she died." 

It was only a little worn-out Prayer-Book, but all filled with writ- 
ten papers, and locks of hair, and dates, and certificates — frail, fluttering 
scraps that dropped all over the table, but unanswerable champions 
for the honor of dead men and the purity of dead women. 

" Par la grace tie Dieu ! " exclaimed the notary, while the tears 
fell from his eyes on the precious relics, discolored and worn from 



388 • FICTION. 

bodily contact. Marie sank on her knees by the table, holding Mar- 
celite tight by the hand. 

" Par la grace de Dieu ! Nothing is wanting here — nothing, 
nothing except the forgiveness of this good woman, and the assur- 
ances of our love and gratitude. And they say," turning to Madame, 
he hazarded the bold step of taking both her hands in his, " they 
say," recollecting the tender pressure on his arm, he ventured still 
further, " they say, Eugenie, that the days of heroism are past, and 
they laugh at our romance ! " 



ON THE WATCH. * 

BY CHARLES PATTON DIMITRY. 

In common with the rest of Alderley, Mr. Creech has been in a state 
of doubt and uncertainty during the time of Captain Vernon's absence 
from the house in Balfour Street ; and he passes that time in self- 
questionings as to what that absence will result in. The morning 
hours find him looking out listlessly, and studying, brick by brick, the 
masonry of the old house. He feels certain that the mystery who 
inhabits it has not yet returned from that visit to Eden Lodge whereof 
all Alderley is ringing. He feels certain of this, because at no time 
has he been absent from his post of observation, during the hours of 
the day at the glass door of his shop, and during the hours of the night 
at the window of his sleeping apartment. He is also confident that 
the old man — the companion of him who dwells in the house over the 
way — has not been out on the street since Captain Yernon's departure. 
If asked why he is confident of this, he will probably answer that he 
has been on the watch and he hasn't seen him go in or out under the 
lion's head in all that time. This, however, is a matter of speculation 
and surmise. 

Certain it is, though, that up to twilight on the night of the second 
day of Captain Yernon's absence, no evidences of his return have met 
the eye of the little tobacconist, sitting at his nightly window, watch- 
ing and waiting. 

The street is well-nigh deserted. The larger portion of Alderley at 
this hour is gathered about snug fires, chatting comfortably over the 
events of the day, and not a few of them wondering: What will 
come of it ? 

The smoke from hundreds of chimneys, joining the gathering 
shadows of the night, hangs like a curtain above Alderley, and through 
this veil the lamps glimmer and twinkle in a weak and uncertain 
way. 

Not so weak, though, but that Mr. Creech, leaning his head 
against the casement of the window and looking out vacantly into 
the smoke and shadow, can see something to reward his long hours of 
laborious vigil ! 

What is it ? 

* [From The House in Bui four Street (1868).] 



390 FICTION. 

Creeping up the street, guiltily, and with cautious steps, he sees 
the figure of a man advancing toward the house in Balfour Street. 
Is there anything remarkable about this figure thus creeping up % Is 
there anything to cause Mr. Creech to reflect, in the long cloak, and in 
the slim, lithe figure of the man himself ? 

There is a lamp immediately opposite the tobacconist's shop. The 
figure has reached this lamp, and is standing under it, and is looking 
up (curiously, it seems to the watcher) at the windows of the old 
house. Mr. Creech rubs his eyes, and blows with his breath upon the 
window near which he is sitting, and wipes the moisture away with 
his sleeve, and looks out eagerly. He will not be certain — he is not 
certain of anything in these later days — but he is willing to wager 
high that he has once before seen the man who stands under the gas- 
light. 

Not that he can tell this by the stranger's features, for he cannot 
see his face, concealed as it is by the slouched hat and the shawl 
wrapped about his neck. But, unless he is much mistaken, he has seen 
that cloak before. 

Yes ; he has it now ! The cloaked mystery that stole away from 
the old house, when he was aroused from sleep by the closing of the 
door. 

Mr. Creech is all eagerness and watchful anxiety now. He sees 
the mystery that the old house conceals gathering darker and darker 
around him and carrying him with it to the end. And he sees, with 
an affrighted curiosity, the cloaked figure come from under the light 
and cross the street and stand in the shadow of the mandarin before 
his own door. What next? Staring down on him from his dark 
room, the tobacconist sees him light a match against the mandarin's 
leg and hold it to his lips. He is about to smoke. Not a cigar, nor a 
pipe, but a cigarette. A foreigner now, he'll be sworn ! Whatever 
doubt he may have had before, as to whether the man whom he saw 
on that eventful night, sitting and talking with Captain Vernon in the 
old house, were really a foreigner, is dispelled now. The cigarette has 
decided the matter. 

The figure on the pavement below, standing in the shadow of the 
mandarin, smokes and stares for a half -hour at the house over the way. 
The tobacconist, alert and watchful, from his post at the window stares 
for a half-hour at him. 

In this lapse of time the darkness has gathered more deeply, and 
the smoke has joined it more visibly, and, together, they cover Alderley 
with a dense curtain. No man is abroad now. No man in Balfour 
Street save the cloaked mystery, staring at the house over the way 
and patiently waiting. 



ON THE WATCH. 391 



Waiting for what ? 



What sound is that which strikes the ear of the little tobacconist 
and that of the figure leaning against the mandarin ? What sound is 
it that has the power to cause them both to lean simultaneously for- 
ward — the man below out of the shadow, and the man above with his 
face thrust to the extreme limit of the window — and to gaze in the 
direction from which it proceeds ? 

It is the echo of footfalls, ringing out angrily on the quiet night 
and coming toward the house in Balfour Street from the direction of 
the stables. 

The few moments that pass seem like hours to the tobacconist. 
How do they seem to the man below ? 

Looking in the direction from which comes the sound of the invis- 
ible heel upon the pavement, the tobacconist sees, emerging out of the 
smoke and the darkness and walking into the circle of light that falls 
from the lamp, a form that does not require a second look to establish 
its identity. A form vast and towering, and with angry, gesticulat- 
ing hands. The form of Captain Horace Vernon, late of Her Majesty's 
service. 

In the quick glance that he gives below, after satisfying himself of 
this, Mr. Creech sees the man upon the pavement draw farther back 
into the shadow and throw his cigarette upon the pavement and stamp 
it out. He does not wish to be seen by the man who has just appeared 
upon the scene, the little tobacconist thinks. 

Ko time for surmises now ! 

Captain Vernon has walked out of the circle of light and is stand- 
ing before the door of the old house. His hand is upon the knocker ; 
but he hesitates to raise it. 

All this the little tobacconist can see in the uncertain light that 
comes from the lamp ; and of all this, too, the man below is witness. 

Staring down with trembling eagerness, Mr. Creech waits for what 
is to follow. Will Captain Vernon arouse the old man in the house, 
and will he pass under the lion's head ? No ! He has dropped the 
knocker and has turned away from the door. He stands for a moment, 
a shadow against the darker shadow of the opposite wall, and then 
walks away in the direction from which he has come. The man below, 
peering out of his place of concealment, follows him with his eye. 
The tobacconist above observes them both. 

Captain Vernon has passed again under the lamp, and his form is 
again becoming indistinct in the night. The sound of his footfall 
becomes fainter, but he is not so far off but that the tobacconist can 
see his hand raised heavenward and threatening the stars. 

But what of the man below \ 



392 • FICTION. 

He, too, is moving. He has crossed the street and is following 
Captain Yernon. But no sound of footfalls comes to the tobacconist's 
ear as he walks. If Mr. Creech were asked to describe his manner of 
walking at this moment, he feels certain that he would describe him as 
walking on his toes. He does not walk boldly, either. Rather does 
he court the obscurity of the houses and the shadow of the walls. 
Creeping cautiously, not too fast to overtake the man ahead of him, 
and not so slow as to lose sight of him, the tobacconist sees him, too, 
pass under the lamp and into the gloom beyond. 

Then, as though a voice were calling upon him to follow, Mr. 
Creech moves away from the window and gropes down the stairs and 
goes into the street. He forgets his great-coat, and the cold air chills 
him. But his thoughts are elsewhere in that moment. They are with 
Captain Yernon passing, a square away, under the lamp at the corner, 
with the cloaked figure cautiously following him. 

He turns the key in the door, buttons his coat about him, and then 
moves silently behind the man who had been watching and waiting in 
the shadow of the mandarin. 

Now what shall the little tobacconist see ? 

If he have not a stout heart in his bosom, and if he be not a bold 
enough man to look death calmly in the face, let him go back ! 



A MORNING-GLORY 



BY M. E. M. DAVIS. 



[Mollie Evelyn (Moore) Davis, wife of Major Thomas E. Davis, editor of the New 
Orleans Picayune, is the author of Minding the Gap, and Other Poems (1870), and In 
War Times at La Rose Blanche (1887). Her prose is simple, pathetic, and graceful. Long 
before she had attained national fame as a poet, one of her critics said : " Taking Miss 
Moore's poeins all in all, they indicate a wide range of excellence, a lofty sweep of thought, 
a subtle gift in allegory and personification, and richness in exquisite fancies."] 

" Dey is sholy figktin' up yander somewhurs pas' de ben' o' de 
river," said Uncle Joshua, shaking his head mournfully. " Dat rum- 
berlin' am de canyun-balls bustm' fum de canyuns, an' dat crackerlin' 
am de shot-guns an' de muskits. Oh, Lord ! what foolishness is done 
tu'n de hade o' dy people, dat mek 'em lif up de han' ginse one anoder 
ter 'stroy de Ian', an' ter full up de Valley o' Armyergedjen wid blood 
eenermos' ter de bridles o 1 de bosses ! — Don't you be skeered, Mis' 
Lucy, honey," he broke off abruptly, turning his kindly old face 
toward my mother. " Don't you be skeered ; ain't nobody gwine ter 
tech er ha'r o' yo' hade whilse yo' Uncle Joshua ban' am hot." 

A heavy boom like the crash of distant thunder had startled us as 
we sat at the breakfast-table. Mother had arisen, trembling, when the 
sound came again — and again — and finally seemed to be merged into 
one continuous roar that palpitated along the ground and made the 
house quiver faintly beneath our feet. She had gone out on the back 
veranda, leaving the food untouched on her plate ; and there the 
household was gathered — black and white — listening and looking in 
strained expectation. 

A cold little wind blew in our faces, but the azure January sky 
laughed cloudless in the yellow sunshine, save where a vaporous ridge 
of smoke was gradually spreading along the tops of the moss-hung 
trees in the bend of the river. 

As the morning wore away, sharper and shriller sounds smote our 
ears, coming nearer one while, and then receding like the waves of the 
sea ; and sometimes we almost thought we heard confused cries and 
hoarse shouts. 

At first there had been a good deal of noise and excitement 

* [In War Times at La Rose Blanche. Copyright, 1888, by D. Lothrop Company, 
of Boston.] 



394 FICTION. 

about the place. The field-hands came hurrying in ; the women ran 
up, and many of them crept under the veranda of the "great-house" 
or huddled in the lower halls ; the men hung, hesitating, around the 
cabins in the Quarter for a while and then disappeared ; old Aunt Rose 
came across the back yard driving the forgotten babies before her like 
a Hock of little brown woolly sheep, and mounting the steps painfully 
between Uncle Joshua and Mammy she was placed in mothers own 
chair in the wide sitting-room, where a cheerful wood-fire blazed, and 
where the babies toddled about as much at home on the flowered 
carpet as on the bare floor of Mammy's cabin. 

'After a while, however, a stillness fell over La Rose Blanche and 
over the group on the gallery. Even the four little boys sat hand in 
hand in a row together on the top step, silent, and with small sober 
faces turned in the direction of the unwonted sounds. 

But they jumped up and flew to Mammy, hiding their faces in her 
skirts, as old Jupe, who was lying at their feet, lifted his head sud- 
denly and uttered a long lugubrious howl, and at the same moment a 
volle} r of shots rang sharply out at the farther edge of the rear cane- 
fields, followed by a rushing, trampling sound, and another but more 
irregular volley. 

And a confused mass of men came flying across the yellow stubble 
of the field, striding over the low hedge and leaping the ditch, almost 
at the very spot where the soldiers had come swarming over last sum- 
mer. Only, these flying men, who clutched their guns and breathed 
heavily as they ran, wore gray uniforms. Their faces were grimy 
with smoke and dust ; and here and there one wore a bloody bandage 
about his head in lieu of a cap. 

Some of them glanced up as they dashed obliquely across the } T ard, 
and one, a boyish fellow with dark eyes shining in his swarthy face, 
even smiled and cheered as he caught sight of mother's down-stretched 
arms and silent, prayerful face. He disappeared with the rest around 
the corner of the house ; others passed lower down by the stables and 
swept across the orange-plantation ; others, farther down still, skirted 
along the hedge — in all, perhaps, a couple of hundred men, though they 
seemed thrice that number. 

Sharp shots still echoed behind them, and hardly had they begun 
to leap over or break through the rose-hedges bordering, on either 
side, the wide lane, when a straggling line of men in blue came pant- 
ing over the cane-stubble, and striding the low hedge, and leaping the 
ditch, and rushing across the grounds in hot pursuit. 

We ran down the long hall and out upon the front veranda, and 
stood there breathless. It was like a dream, with men as phantoms 
blown across it. Not a word or a cry, except that one little cheer 



A MORNING-GLORY. 395 

that broke from the dark-eyed boy as he sped past, had escaped the 
lips of pursued or pursuer since they came first in sight. 

And now, the foremost line — though, indeed, neither blue nor gray 
were formed in lines, but dashed along in irregular and broken squads 
that were here shoulder to shoulder, and there were wide apart— the 
gray line was now sweeping across the field beyond the lane ; we saw 
them run up the sloping embankment of the wide ditch that marks the 
boundary of La Rose Blanche. Their forms stood dark and sharply 
outlined for a brief second against the sky ; then dropped out of sight. 

Their pursuers, hardly equalling them in numbers, followed im- 
petuously ; but stopped suddenly, as a flash of fire ran along the 
weedy edge of the embankment, a puff of bluish vapor arose, and a 
rattling volley burst and went echoing by. For a long time — it seems 
to me as I remember it, though it was in reality, perhaps, but a few 
moments — the bluecoats held their ground, and the crash of inter- 
changing shots filled the air with confusion. 

M'lindy and 'Riah and Sophy fled shrieking into the hall, but I 
think none of the others stirred ; the little boys only shrunk closer to 
Mammy and Uncle Joshua, and Mandy and I pressed a little nearer 
to mother and cousin Nellie, as the bullets came whizzing by. One 
even struck a post of the veranda, just above where cousin Nellie's 
canary swung in its gilded cage, flattened and fell on the steps. 
Mammy reached up and unhooked the cage. " Hit's dade" she said 
Avith a sob, as she took out the little creature, which had not been 
struck by the ball, but had perhaps died of fright. The fluffy yellow 
ball lying motionless in Mammy's large dusky palm stands out curi- 
ously vivid amid the disordered memories of that fearful time. 

There was a sudden wavering among the men in blue ; they fell 
back, at first step by step, and then more rapidly. Then from 
behind the embankment the men in gray arose. They appeared once 
more outlined against the sky, and a yell, hoarse, harsh, terrible, 
burst from them as they rushed down the slope. A swift light, like a 
streak of forked lightning, darted along their now almost compact 
ranks. It was the glinting of the low sun upon their bayonets and 
upon their polished gun-barrels. 

It seemed but a moment before they all panted by again ; the 
straggling line of blue followed this time by the straggling line of 
gray, leaping the ditch, striding over the hedge, sweeping across the 
yellow stubble, and plunging into the wood. An occasional shot came 
ringing back, and once again the wild yell was borne to us, fainter, 
but more exultant still ; but soon we heard nothing but the distant 
boom of the cannon, which itself was coming at longer intervals, and 
which died away in silence as the beams of the setting sun turned to 



396 FICTION. 

a dark yellowish red the low-lying cloud of smoke caught on. the tree- 
tops in the bend of the river. 

" 'Pears like dey all uz playin' Deer an' Dogs," remarked Mandy. 
" An' hit's powerful hard ter tell which air de deer an' which air de 
dogs ! " 

When we ran again to the back veranda to watch " the battle " — 
as we always called it afterward — roll back into the wood, we found 
two soldiers seated on the steps. They wore faded gray uniforms and 
ragged shoes and tattered caps. One of them, an old man with a gray 
beard, and homely, wrinkled face, was tying a soiled handkerchief 
about the other one's arm. 

" Oh, it ain't nothin', ma'am,"' said the boy, for he was a mere lad, 
looking up bashfully at mother and cousin Nell, who hovered over 
him Avith clean bandages and lint and healing salve. " Jest a scratch, 
ain't it, dad ? " 

The old man was presently telling mother, while the boy ate a 
slice of bread and drank some milk, where they came from. 

" 'Way out yander by the Warloopy Eiver in Texas. The ole 
woman an' the gals is thar a-makin' of the craps, an' me an' Jake 
air a-carryin' on the war ! " He laughed gayly and passed an affec- 
tionate arm around Jake's thin shoulders. " Come, Jake," he added, 
rising to his feet, " the boys'll be a-hikin' away 'fore we git thar 'f we 
don't look out. We jest put in fur a little scrimmage, ma'am ; the 
Yanks air a heap too many fur we-uns roun' in these here diggin's." 

And they trudged away. 

We watched them stepping cheerily across the field, the boy still 
gathered within the long bony arm. They paused and looked back 
when they reached the verge of the field, and a moment later they 
were lost to sight. 

It was many a long day before we saw a gray uniform again. 

The next morning was quiet enough. The women and boys came 
creeping back from the swamp to which they had fled at the first 
crack of the rifles ; but the men, except Uncle Joshua, had for the 
time wholly disappeared. 

Old Aunt Rose and the flock of babies remained in the sitting- 
room ; and there mother was tending one of Aunt Ca'lline's " triplers " 
— Marthy, I think it was— who had a fever and sore throat, when 
Uncle Joshua came in, his face wearing a strange, troubled, frightened 
look. He stooped over mother where she knelt by the child's pallet, 
and said something to her in a low voice. A still deeper pallor passed 
over her pale face. She stood up and motioned to cousin Nellie to 
take her place, pressing the glass and spoon she held into her hand, 
and went out without a word. 



A MORNING-GLORY. 397 

At the foot of the steps,' when she found that Mandy and I and 
the four little boys had followed her, she turned and opened her lips 
as if to send us back, but took my hand instead and drew me to her 
side. Uncle Joshua led us through the orange-plantation. The 
leafy boughs over our heads, broken by the bullets of the day before, 
hung down dying and exhaling a sweet musky perfume ; the ground 
in many places was trampled where the soldiers had passed through, 
and the dry grass was crushed into the brown earth. 

We neared the play-house ; and then — I cannot tell why — I sud- 
denly divined what it was that we had come out to see, and I longed 
to stop, but somehow felt as if I could not. 

He was lying there — my Yankee playfellow — close under the 
shadow of the broken hedge, not far from where I had first seen him. 
His face, strange and pallid, was upturned to the sky, his eyes were 
wide open, all their laughing blue faded to a dull opaque gray. One 
arm was thrown up over his head, and the other lay across his breast, 
concealing the bullet hole in his jacket, but not the dark red stain 
which spread along his side and dyed the brown grasses around him. 
His gun was lying a few feet away where it had fallen from his nerve- 
less hand, whose white fingers were still bent as if to grasp it. A 
soft dim sunlight — for the sky was clouding — streamed over him, and 
a bird in the wild peach-tree was twittering gently. 

My mother sprang forward with an agonized cry — the only one 
wrung from those brave lips through all the four years of suspense 
and agony — and threw herself on her knees beside the dead boy, and 
pressed her lips to his cold forehead. 

I stood by quivering, but tearless, while she wiped the ghastly face 
with her handkerchief, and smoothed back the brown, curling hair, 
with little inarticulate caressing murmurs, and pressed the white lids 
over the staring eyes, and sought to compose the stiffened limbs. 

But I burst into a passion of weeping when she gently opened the 
blood-stained jacket and drew from the pocket a packet of letters and 
that photograph of the sweet-faced mother, with the child that " looked 
like me" leaning against "her knee, which he had shown me so proudly 
in the play-house that unforgotten summer day. 

They laid him — Uncle Joshua and Mammy and mother — upon the 
linen sheet, and wrapped its thick, white, scented folds tenderly about 
him. And mother sat beside him while Uncle Joshua and Mammy 
dug the grave. It was sundown before the resting-place was hollowed 
deep enough, and by that time the sky was thick with clouds, a chill 
wind had arisen, and heavy drops of rain were beginning to fall. 

Mandy and I and the little boys had dragged up long garlands of 
green from the ruined rose-hedge, and branches from the wild peach- 



308 < FICTION. 

tree ; and of these Uncle Joshua made a green couch in the bottom of 
the grave, where the earth was moist and cold ; and upon this they 
laid him, with his gun beside him, and over him again they heaped the 
glistening green of rose-brier and honeysuckle. 

It was quite dark when the earth was rounded up to a mound 
above him, and Uncle Joshua and Mammy leaned exhausted on their 
spades. Mother knelt down on the wet ground, her white face shim- 
mering through the darkness, and prayed. Her soft clear voice seemed 
to fill all the wild night and hush it to repose. 

" And to all who loved him, Father, be merciful," she breathed at 
last. " Bless them and comfort them, and give them of thy peace. 
And upon us also have mercy." 

" Amen,''' 1 sobbed Uncle Joshua. 

Then Mammy, who was crouched at the foot of the grave with 
little Percy clasped in one arm and me in the other, began to rock 
herself slowly from side to side, and to wail softly, and presently her 
voice arose in a wild strain, half mournful, half triumphant : 

" I looks at my ban's an' my ban's looks new, 
Gwine whar dey ain't, no mo' dyin'! 
I looks at my feet all bathe' in dew, 
Gwine whar dey ain't no mo' dyin'! 
Cryin' Amen, good Lord, cryin' Amen, 
Gwine whar dey ain't no' mo' dyin' ! " 

She paused abruptly, and when she began again, Percy's shrill 
little voice joined hers and soared with it out into the ever-gathering 

darkness : 

" De angel come an' he shet my eyes, 
Gwine whar dey ain't no mo' dyin'! 
But my Lord he'll open 'em in Pa'adise, 
Gwine whar dey ain't no mo' dyin'! " 

Mother leaned over and touched her gently on the arm. She arose 
and swung the child to her shoulder, and moved away toward the 
house, still singing. 

The strangely blended voices floated back to us, as we followed 
silently through the down-pouring rain : 

" Cryin' Amen, good Lord, cryin' Amen, 
Gwine whar dey ain't no mo' dyin'! " 

A week later, pale and tottering yet from the illness brought on 
by the excitement and exposure of that terrible day, I came with 
Mandy out of the house. The storm of wind and rain that had lasted 
three or four days had been the breaking up of our short winter. 



A MORNING-GLORY. 399 

There were no flowers, but the vines on the trellises were tossing 
up feathery tufts of young leaves ; the lawn was green and gay under 
the warm sky ; and as we passed through the orange-grove the little 
warm wet grasses were soft beneath our feet. In the branches above 
I thought that I smelled blossoms, though we could not find any. 
The grave had been smoothed, a rough cross placed at the head, and 
a board at the foot. The grass had not yet had time to grow in the 
beaten space around. 

But on the top of the mound itself, nestling close against the 
brown earth, lo ! a tiny, pale-blue, delicate morning-glory! Such 
haste had it been in to bloom, the tender little thing, that it had 
hardly waited for the vine to put out a leaf, and had spared no time 
for a curling tendril, but hung there on the end of the single fragile 
stem, swaying in the light breeze, with the dew upon it and a faint 
sweet fragrance at its heart. 

I stooped and plucked it. " For little Ally and for his mother," I 
said to myself, softly. 

And long afterward, the withered morning-glory was laid in the 
mother's own hand, Avhen she came to us and knelt hand in hand with 
my mother above her boy's sodded grave. 



MADELEINE AND BERTHA. 

BY EDWARD DESSOMMES. 

[Edward Dessommes was born in New Orleans, November 17, 1845. At the age of 
twelve he was sent to Paris, where he received a classical education in the "College Ste. 
Barbe." He then studied medicine in the Paris School of Medicine, and was for three 
years an "Externe des Hopitaux." Shortly after the publication of his novel, Femme 
et Statue (1869), his great master, Victor Hugo, then an exile at Guernsey, sent the 
author a piece from his Chatiments with these words : "-4 Vauteur du noble poeme 
Femme et Statue." In 1870 M. Dessommes published Jacques Morel, a romance. After 
the Franco-Prussian War, he studied painting under Leon Bonnat and Jules Dupre. 
He has had several pictures on exhibition in the Paris Salon. In 1887 he returned to 
his birthplace. He is, at present, Assistant Professor of French in Tulane University.] 

My best friend, Viscount Jean, had made some slighting remarks 
about Madeleine, thereby furnishing our club with gossip for a whole 
evening. And so, to my great sorrow, I was forced to challenge him. 
Even now, at this moment, I cannot recall without emotion that bare 
breast which was offered to my sword. Three times I might have 
pierced it, for I was a far better swordsman than Jean ; but my heart 
melted with pity at the mere thought of shedding blood that was so 
much dearer to me than my own. Every time our eyes met, I felt a 
wild impulse to cast away my weapon — to open my arms and press to 
my bosom that heart whose generosity I knew so well. And I know 
that Jean had, at the same moment, the same thought — felt the same 
desire. But what would our seconds have said ? 

After a contest that was long and spiritless, Jean, with a nervous 
movement, extended his arm and made a lunge at me. 

" What is the use of keeping this up any longer ? " I thought, and 
I stood still to receive his thrust. His sword was buried six inches 
deep in my breast. 

How long I was unconscious I know not. When I awoke I seemed 
to return from the depths of the earth, to come forth from nothing- 
ness, from absolute darkness. I had brought back from that perfect 
repose a feeling of ineffable happiness. Ah ! if I could have spoken, 
how I should have prayed : " Leave me — let me rest — give me back my 
beautiful sleep ! " 

As I lifted my leaden eyelids, an intense light shocked my every 
nerve. I heard this light even more than I saw it. It produced a more 
violent excitement in the nerves of hearing than in those of sight. I 
seemed to be in the midst of a clamorous crowd or on the shores of a 



MADELEINE AND BERTHA. 401 

loud-voiced sea. I felt a great longing for the tomb. I was homesick 
for the nothingness and silence of which I had caught a glimpse ; and 
again I closed my eyes. 

All at once I felt in my chest so sharp a pain that I cried out, and 
opening my eyes I saw near me Madeleine. She was weeping — yes, 
real tears ! I remember it all. And this was the woman that they 
accused of being untrue to me! Of course Jean must have made 
advances to her, and been sharply rebuffed. Hence his spite and that 
fine sword thrust. But I could not regret the affair. Had it not 
brought to my eyes a positive proof of Madeleine's love ? She wept — 
believing me dead. I began to feel vaguely the moisture of her lips, 
and the warmth of her tears flowing over my motionless hand. Ah, 
after such bliss one could well die ! Ah, that I had died at this moment, 
with this impression strong in my soul ! 

She deceive me ! But poor Jean ! Even now I had no feeling of 
hate for her calumniator. Betray me — Madeleine — and with this Dr. 
Kaymond, whom I saw even now at the other side of my bed ? He 
was feeling my pulse and examining me closely, but not a muscle of 
his serenely classic face betrayed the emotion that he felt. 

All these thoughts were perfectly clear in my mind, but I could 
not speak, and all the time my ears were ringing with that confused 
murmur — that noise of surf beating on the shore — which kept me from 
hearing the broken words of Madeleine. I gazed at her with all my 
soul. I tried to press her lips with my fingers, which were as cold and 
lifeless as those of a statue. 

I became accustomed to the burning anguish of my wound, and 
passed into a kind of trance — an ecstasy born of suffering and delight 
— a mingling of blood and tears, of warmth and tenderness and light. 
But even then I bitterly regretted the death out of which they had 
dragged me — that annihilation of thought, noise, and light, that 
delicious repose of which I had never dreamed before. 

In this state I remained for a long while — perhaps several days — 
I know not. Then a fire was kindled in my breast, and the blood in 
my veins scalded me as though it were of molten metal. Evidently I 
was delirious, for I seemed to see Madeleine with her head resting on 
the doctor's shoulder. To escape that nightmare I turned away 
abruptly. It was the first movement I was able to make. Fever had 
brought back the blood to my brain, and awakened my senses, so long 
torpid from loss of blood. From that moment I could hear and 
understand. " Come now, Madeleine," murmured the doctor, " let us 
have courage. Who knows but we shall save him still?" And 
Madeline replied roughly : " You can stand it all well enough. But 
what is to become of me, if he has not made a will in my favor ? " 
26 



402 FICTION. 

That speech pierced my heart more sharply than had the sword of 
my friend, and I groaned aloud. 

Madeleine and the doctor rushed towards the bed, and fixed upon 
me looks as cold and as hard as steel — looks that seemed to search out 
my most secret thoughts. After a long silence the doctor said calmly : 
" Don't be alarmed, Madeleine ; it is only the fever rising ; the rush 
of blood to the brain has made him delirious. He understands 
nothing." 

Alas that he did not speak the truth ! I understood, at any rate, 
that I had nothing left but to die ; and once more I longed for 
oblivion. My spirit soared above human misery and treachery. My 
love fled at one bound to such a distance that I saw it as one sees on 
the horizon the peak of a sail gilded by the setting sun, but far be- 
yond recall and on the point of vanishing forever. I was not angry 
with Madeleine. After all, she was only a thing of flesh and blood — 
beautiful and coveted of all men in the splendid bloom of her twenty- 
five years. An atmosphere of desire caressed her lovely form, and it 
was but natural that she should drink it in as she drank in the pure 
air of heaven, that she should warm herself in the rays of love as in 
those of the sun. 

I could look at things now from such a height, I was so freed from 
personal feeling, that her faithfulness could no longer distress me. I 
perceived clearly, and submitted without a murmur to the laws of 
nature — that nature within whose bosom I was about to return. The 
elements which for a moment had united to give me being I could feel 
separating and drifting apart. This time death advanced softly — step 
by step — and I was sinking gently to rest. But even as the eye in 
passing gradually from daylight to darkness is insensibly adapted to 
the rarefied light, so my faculties gradually accustomed themselves to 
this rarefied existence, and recorded in my soul the faintest and most 
subtile of sensations. 

At a sign that I managed to make, Madeleine approached my bed ; 
but, though she touched my fingers, I saw her as if the great ocean 
itself rolled between us. With a superhuman effort I pointed towards 
a little Louis XYI. desk, where I kept my papers, and uttered the 
words " My will ! " A blue flame kindled in Madeleine's eyes, and a 
divine smile irradiated her beautiful face. She seemed all at once 
transfigured into an angel of light. 

From that time my sensations were dull and confused, and by 
degrees my respiration grew slower and more feeble. My throat 
began to rattle with a harsh noise that grated upon me painfully, and 
then I ceased to breathe. I heard the doctor say : " It is all over ! " 
Madeleine threw herself upon me with cries of despair. In her grati- 



MADELEINE AND BERTHA. 403 

tude for what I had done, all her tenderness for me was revived. I 
believe that she never loved me so ardently as when she felt certain 
that I was dead, and that she was my heiress. She shut my eves 
and kissed them — the velvet of her lips awakening in my rigid flesh a 
thrill that was too faint to be perceptible to the eyes of the living. 

The night came on slowly ; they lit three candles and set them on 
a little table at the head of my bed. Madeleine and the doctor shrouded 
me for my last sleep and then sat down to watch near me. I tried 
hard to keep from hearing what they said as they whispered together. 
They were making plans for the future, and she no longer wept. He 
murmured in her ear words of passionate love, the same fond vows 
that I had once breathed to her, though one would have thought that 
she heard them now for the first time. 

They spoke of me with affection. " He was a good friend,'' de- 
clared Raymond ; " rather too guileless, perhaps. 1 ' 

" A heart of pure gold," said Madeleine, beginning to weep again. 
She came and pressed a lingering kiss on my forehead, and this time 
her lips burned me like hot iron. " He is already as cold as ice," she 
sobbed. " See here ! " cried Raymond in a brutal tone, " enough of 
this farce. Let us get away from here." And he forced her Out of 
the room. 

The lids of one of my eyes were imperfectly closed, leaving between 
them a tiny aperture through which I could clearly distinguish objects 
in my direct line of vision. It was, however, a very narrow field of 
view, and I could see nothing that was passing at the other end of the 
room. 

I was all alone now, and I felt my body freezing through to the 
very bone. At midnight the light began to flicker and dance, distort- 
ing the commonplace objects before me into glimmering and fantastic 
forms. The candles sputtered and went out. But, strange to say, I 
found that I could see through the darkness ; I could still recognize all 
the objects before me— only everything was of a soft, uniform gray- 
all color had been blotted out. Then, little by little, my sight became 
clouded ; the tissues of my eyes were thickening, and the fluids were 
being slowly absorbed. 

All at once it seemed to me that the air in the room was agitated, 
and I heard a faint rustling. A Something showed itself in my field 
of vision — a Something snowy white. A gracefully floating drapery 
of marble was all about me. Fingers were laid on my eyes — fingers 
modelled of some stuff that had neither the warmth nor the elasticity 
of life, and my stiffened eyelids were reopened violently. Then I saw 
standing at my pillow a woman, or rather an angel of white marble, 
whose half-furled wings almost touched the floor. Her hair fell in 



404 FICTION. 

heavy masses on her shoulders, mingling itself with the soft down of 
her wings, and rippling the whole length of her body, whose chaste 
drapery descended to her feet. Her eyes, devoid of pupils, looked 
down upon me ; and from her closed lips came a breathless voice, came 
words that were scarcely articulate, but still very distinct. " Thou 
knowest me not," she said, " and yet thou didst once love me tenderly. 
Recall to thy memory that sombre chapel at the church of San 
Lorenzo, in Florence, where thou wast wont to come so often and seat 
thyself before a tomb of white marble." 

Then I remembered, and from my immobile lips there came forth 
a breathless voice — a voice like that of the statue which was speak- 
ing to me. " Bertha ! " I cried. 

" Yes, I am Bertha," she answered, " the statue of Bertha Ruccellai. 
I have not forgotten, in spite of the ten years that have passed. 
Almost a child then, and all crushed with thy first love wound, thou 
hadst sought death on the battle-field, and death had not deigned to 
take thee. Remember thy emotion the first time thou didst see me ! 
For three months didst thou come almost daily to gaze upon me 
through long hours. I read thy thoughts, but my response thou 
couldst not hear ; for only the dead hear the voice of the dead. I 
loved thee for the tears that thou didst shed for me, unknown — for 
my youth and my beauty so untimely gathered to the tomb. And 
since then my love, pure and incorruptible as the marble of which I 
am made, has never ceased to watch over thee. Oh, how impatiently 
have I waited and longed for that moment when thy death should 
reunite us ! Now thou art my own, and I am thine. Stone though I 
be, I have suffered agonies when I saw thou couldst forget me and 
squander thy love in vulgar passions. I was jealous of the Venus of 
Milo at the time thou wast bewitched by her — that carnal statue 
which lacks a soul. And that other soulless creature — her also have 
I often cursed— that Madeleine, to whom I now owe my happiness, 
since it was she who caused thy death. 

" Come, let us depart together for that peerless Florence. Thou 
shalt dwell with me at San Lorenzo ; for knowest thou not that the 
dead loved of the gods are transformed into beautiful statues, and the 
artist who believes he fashions these lovely forms with mallet and 
chisel is only the victim of an illusion — is naught but an instrument 
in the hands of an all-powerful god ? 

" Come ! We shall thrust an arrow into the wound in thy breast, 
and thou shalt be called St. Sebastian. There is an empty niche 
just by my own, and we shall see each other always. During the 
day, it is true, we statues must rest in our places because of the trav- 
ellers who come to visit us ; but it is delightfully cool in these old 



MADELEINE AND BERTHA. 405 

churches, with their great thick walls. And when night is come, we 
do as we please. 

" We shall wander in the moonlight among the monuments of the 
flowery city, in sacred churches, and under tranquil cloisters ; at Santa 
Maria Novella, under the dome of Brunelleschi, in the tower of Giotto 
— that gem of mosaic ; at Santa Croce, among the illustrious dead. 

"We shall see again the picture:; of Jie Ufflzi and of the Pitti 
Palace ; we shall talk with our sister statues ; we shall spend many 
nights under the Loggia de Lanzi in company with Perseus ; we shall 
enter into comradeship with the Night, who ponders so sadly before the 
tomb of the Medici. We shall stroll in disguise through the squares 
and promenades — at the Palazzo Yecchio, at the Signoria, at the Cas- 
cine, and beside the yellow Arno. We shall go out into the country, 
to Fiesole, and even to Camaldules— I clinging to thy arm. And 
when thou art wearied with walking, thou shalt cling about my neck, 
and I will open my great wings." 

The music of that superhuman voice at once lulled and enraptured 
me ; and a new life, more subtile than the old, was gently distilled 
through my frozen limbs. Now I could move my hand ; I could 
move my eyes. Oh, wonder ! my breast, my arms, my whole body 
was stripped of its raiment, and my flesh was changed to the most 
delicate and spotless marble ! 

And Bertha, leaning over my couch, clasped me in her arms and 
lifted me without an effort. My head rested upon her shoulder, and 
her mouth that was without breath she pressed closely to my marble 
lips. 

" Come," she murmured ; " I love thee ! I am thine for eternity ! " 

Then, opening her archangel wings, she bore me through the sky 
towards the Orient where the night was already paling into dawn. 

(Englished by B. A. F.) 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEKEMIAH JOHNSON. 

BY RUTH McENERY STUART. 

[ Ruth (McEnery) Stuart has, through the publication of her Golden Wedding, 
and Other Tales (1893), won for herself a national reputation as a master of dialect. 
Born in Avoyelles Parish, La., she was educated, for the most part, in New Orleans, 
In 1879 she was married to Mr. Alfred Odin Stuart, a well-known planter of Wash- 
ington, Ark., who died a few years afterwards. In 1892 Mrs. Stuart took up her resi- 
dence in New York City, where she was for some time editor of Harper's Bazar.] 

It was a hot day in August. Groups of cattle stood about in shady 
spots chewing their cuds, gazing out with mild resignation upon the 
gleaming field. Horses here and there rolled in the grass to cool them- 
selves ; restless hogs moved from one mud puddle to another, grunting 
a protest against the rising mercury ; noisy hens, settling themselves 
about in gossipy squads under the barnhouse floor, chattered as they 
scratched down into the substratum of moist sand for cooler spots for 
their feathered breasts. Such was the picture in Judge Williams's barn- 
yard on this particular August day. 

At the extreme end of the enclosure, where a little branch wound 
its way beneath the shade of a sweet-gum tree, a flock of puddle ducks 
floated about in the shadow ; and here, on the grassy bank, a fat black 
woman stood before a row of tubs, washing. Across the creek, and it 
was only a step, and beyond a wild-rose hedge, quite out of sight, 
perched upon the top crossing of a rail fence, on guard over the judge's 
family washing, which lay bleaching in the sun, was the subject of 
this sketch — Lamentations of Jeremiah Johnson. 

Out in the full glare of the August sun he sat, with head sunburned 
and bare. He was black, tall, lank, and — unpretty, to put it mildly ; 
and he wore to-day a single garment which partly covered, but did not 
ornament, his homely person. A yellow calico dress, buttoned (or 
rather unbuttoned) behind, and caught by a rusty pin midway between 
neck and waist, boasted a long skirt which fell nearly to his feet when 
he stood, but now, lifted by his projecting knees, it fell in foliated 
curves, from which the slender black legs dangled as dark stamens 
project from the yellow calyx of the marsh-lily. 

Lamentations was now twelve years old, and yet, although he was 

* [From A GoldenWedding, and Other Tales (Harper Bros., publishers). Included 
in The Louisiana Dome Book by special arrangement.] 




RUTH MCENERV STUART. 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH JOIIXSON. 407 

the only child of his mother, he had never possessed a masculine gar- 
ment of any description. He was the last and only survivor of a family 
of ten children, and as the others had all been daughters, who had died 
at various ages from infancy up to fifteen years, there were feminine 
garments of assorted sizes awaiting him at his birth, from the guinea- 
blue baby-frocks to the large dresses of homespun which lay folded 
away in his mother's press, an inheritance into which he was slowly 
and surely growing, and from which he would fain have held back, if 
there had been any relief at the other end ; but Lamentations saw 
that the only way out of this dilemma was through it, and so, if he 
prayed at all, he prayed to grow. 

" Ef I could jes grow past dem gal frocks, I'd be willin' ter die de 
nex' minute, 'caze clen I could die like what I is, an' 'sped myself as I 
on'y kin "spect myself in breeches ! I ain't nuver gwine ter git no 
ambitioms nor no mannishness s'long's I got ter roam roun' in dese heah 
yaller-buff gal cloe's ! " 

In this fashion Lamentations was wont to give vent to his feelings 
on the subject of his attire ; but he protested secretly, as he found him- 
self the worse always for any open rebellion, his mother often beating 
him, and declaring that he was " dat proud, dat he was a reg'lar old 
maid," and that " what was good enough for the angels in Heab'n was 
good enough for him." This allusion to his departed sisters generally 
worked her up to the whipping point, and so Lamentations kept a dis- 
creet silence, though he rebelled in secret. 

Lamentations' parents, Antony and Priscilla, had been a worldly 
pair in their youth, and Antony regarded the birth and death of nine 
daughters consecutively as a visitation of Providence for their early 
sins. 

" It shorely is a visitatiom, an' a double visitatiom," he had lamented. 
" Fust an' fo'most, de bare fac' o' havin' nine gals han'-runnin' is a 
visitatiom ; an' secon' and hin'most, de losin' ob 'em arter you is got 
'em is a double correctiom wid de scourgin' rod." 

One evening Antony and Priscilla sat inside their cabin door. It 
was Sunday, and they had been to meeting. On the Sunday before, 
they had buried their last child, the ninth. 

The sun was setting behind the hill, and casting a last ray over the 
little cemetery at its foot, brought into clear view the row of graves 
that held the records of their man}- losses. 

Antony gazed intently at them for some time. Finally he said : 
" P'cilla, I Vlieve dat the visitatiom's done finished ! I don't blieve 
Gord's gwine ter give an' teck no mo' gals ! " 

" Huccome you ca'culatin' so free, I like ter know?" said his 
wife. 



408 FICTION. 

u Well, I's been obserbin', an' a-speculatin' ; an' a-settin heah 
a-studyin', I's come ter dis conclusiom " — 

" What conclusiom is you come ter, Antony ? " 

" I come ter dis conclusiom — dat nine am de fatal figgur. Now 
you jes lis'n ter me ! Look at de signs o' de nines ! " 

" I knows de signs o' de nines," interrupted Priscilla. 

" What signs you know ? " 

" G'way f oni heah, Antony ! You reckin 'caze I ain't learned in 
the books dat I 'ain't got no eclucatiom ! Even a yo'ng kitten, what 
is got de leastest sense in all creatiom, is got sense enough not ter try 
ter open hits eyes on dis sinful worl' befo' de nine days o' darkness is 
out." 

" ' De nine days o' darkness ! ' Yer jes struck it right dar, P' cilia. 
Now we's all jes de same as new-borned kittens befo' Gord. In fact 
we ain't 'spornserble fo' not beirt kittens, an' new-born, an' bline at 
dat. Now, jes fo' de sake o' de argimentatiom o' de subjec', let's us 
supposin' dat all de worl' is new-borned kittens, den it follers, in co'se, 
dat all de worl' is borned bline, which is de case, bein' borned in a state 
o' sin an mizry. Ain't dat so ? " 

" You goes so fas' I kyan't keep up wid yer, Antony. Say all dat 
ag'in. I ain't a-gwine ter give in ter nufn' what mecks me out no 
varmint, 'less'n I sees de proof, ef you is willin' ter argify yo'se'f inter 
a torm-cat." 

" Hush, P'cilla. You's a-rlmnin , away wid dis subjec' jes de same's 
a cat runs away wid a mouse. Now you lis'n ter me, 'spornserble, not 
fo' de callin' o' no names, which I ain't a-doin', but fo' de sake o' de 
substantiatiom o' de proof." 

" Substantiation of the proof " was too much for Priscilla. The 
words were well chosen, and gained her respectful attention, while 
Antony slowly repeated his argument, and in a moment she had 
agreed that all men were " jes de same as new-borned kittens befo' 
Gord." 

" Well," said Antony, " dat's a fixed fac'. Now, ef we's de same as 
new-borned kittens, don't you see dat we's got ter go froo our nine 
days o' darkness befo' we comes out in de light ? " 

Priscilla saw it. 

" Well, now, ain't de losin' of a baby, even ef 'tis a gal baby — ain't 
dat a day o' darkness % " 

" Dat's so," said Priscilla. 

" An' ain't a-losin' nine ob 'em goin' froo nine days c? darkness t " 

Priscilla raised up her face and assented respectfully. She was 
convinced. 

" Now, look a-heah ! " Antony continued. " We's done passed froo 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH JOHNSON. 409 

de darkness, an' my b'lief is dat Gord's gwine ter raise de visitatiom 
an' show us de light — dat is, if we ad's 'spornserble." 

" Antony ! " 

" What yer want, P'cilla ? " 

Priscilla eyed him askance as she said, " You talks like you's gitt'n' 
'ligion ! " 

" I ain't a-sayin' I's gitt'n' 'ligion, P'cilla, but I's a-speakin' f om de 
innermos'nesses ob m} r heart." 

" Antony ! " 

" What yer want, P'cilla ? " 

His wife smiled faintly as she replied, " De time I'll b'lieve you's 
got 'ligion '11 be de time yer gits de spring-chicken honger an' stays in 
de baid all night an' nuver bodders 'long o' no hainrooses ! " 

Antony did not join in the laugh that followed this, but said seri- 
ously : " You is a awful game-maker, P'cilla, an' I ain't a-denyin' dat 
I's gi'n yer plenty o' 'casion ter meek game o' me. But look heah ! " 

He rose slowly from his chair, and pointing to the little row of 
graves, now barely visible in the approaching twilight, he said : " Look 
a-heah ! A-standin' heah to-night, a-p'intin' ter dat row o' gal graves 
on de hill-side yonder, each one ob 'em which holds a sign an' a symbol 
ob a double visitatiom, in de givin' an' de teckin' ob a gal chile, I stan' 
up an' say befo' Gord, dat ef he holps me, I's a-gwine ter ac' 'spornser- 
ble an' opright, befo' anudder nine graves gits a start on us, becaze 
Gord don't do nut'n' by halves, an' ef he's started a-chastisin' us by 
de fatal nines, he ain't a-gwine ter back down on it ! " 

Priscilla glanced toward the row of graves and heaved a deep sigh. 
Then, slowly turning from her husband, she opened the door of a safe 
at her side, and taking from it a tin plate of cold bacon and greens, 
and reseating herself with it on her lap, she began to eat them, raising 
the dark green shreds with her fingers into the air above her head, 
and slowly lowering them into her capacious mouth. Priscilla was of 
the earth, earthy. She had mourned heartily and boisterously over 
each of her nine bereavements ; but her bosom was not the home of 
sorrow, and when a grief fell into it, it was as an acid falling into an 
alkali. The effect was effervescent, evanescent, and when once the 
bubbling ceased, the same acid could not stir it again. 

She grew serious at mention of her dead children, and ate the 
flabby garlands of greens in grim silence, chewing meditatively, and 
ruminating almost sadly over each mouthful before elevating another 
for inspection and consumption. 

It was in the spring following this that to the house of Antony and 
Priscilla came a little son. Antony was in the field "chopping 
cotton" when the news came to him. He behaved with strange 



410 FICTION. 

excitement on this occasion, dropping his hoe as he exclaimed : " De 
visitatiom's done h'isted ! Glory be to Gord ! " and on the Sunday 
following he did what, notwithstanding his reformed life, he had 
never done before. He made a public profession of religion, and, in 
the language of Brother Williamson, the officiating minister, " Cornse- 
crated hissef and all o' hisn to de service o' de Lord ! " 

Antony expressed great concern as to the selection of a name for 
his son. It must be a Bible name- — a name that should be an inspira- 
tion to the lad as well as a certificate of his father's piety. 

Brother Williamson suggested the names of the Gospels, but Antony 
objected. Matthews and Johns were disgracing the saints all over the 
country now, " and," he contended, " John Johnson wouldn't do no- 
how, 'caze hit soun's like a pusson's a-stammerin', an' jes as sho as I'd 
call John Johnson, I'd git ter Johnin' an' couldn't stop. No, don't 
gimme none o' dem stutterin' names ! " 

" How "bout Mark % " ventured "Williamson. 

" Mark — Mark," he repeated reflectively, " a black Mark ? Don't you 
know, Brer Williamson, dat a black mark nuver stan's for no good ( " 

" Dat's so — looking at it dat-a-way. Dat's so. Well, what yer say 
to Luke ? " 

" No, sir ! " he quickly replied. " Ain't you jes preached las' Sun- 
day ag'in Lukewarm Christians ? Dat won't do." 

Williamson hesitated ; then, counting on his fingers, he slowly 
said : " Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts — Acts is a good name, Brer 
Johnson ; s'posin' yer names his name Acts ? " 

Antony hesitated. There was a suggestion of energy in the name 
— even a hint of good works ; still he did not seem quite to like it. 
Finally he said : " I did know a man once-t what named his boy Ac's, 
but he come ter it reg'lar. He had all o' Ac's's pardners hand-runnin' 
— Maffew, Mark, Luke, an' John ; an' hit seems ter me like goin' 
backward, somehow — like turnin' de 'postles catawarmosed, an' treatin' 
'em onrespecf ul, ter name de fust boy Ac's. De fac' is, Brer William- 
son, hit looks ter me kind o' deceitful ter do dat— hit's like sneaking 
up berhindt 'em like, an' Maffew an' Mark an' Luke an' John would 
somehow be slighted ! — an' besides, it don't seem as I's ezzacly got a 
right ter fetch Ac's in heah, berhindt a whole passel o' Callines an' 
M'rias an' sech. No ; I wants ter fine a name what stan's ter hitse'f 
like — what I could sort o' teck liberties wid movin' outn its place, one 
dat don't b'long ter no crowd." 

The preacher ventured several other suggestions, but none seemed 
to suit. 

Priscilla, with wifely devotion, wished to call the boy Antony, but 
to this he would not listen. 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH JOHNSON. 411 

" No, no," he protested ; " my name ain't clean enough. Hit's been 
mixed up wid too much devilm«W ter fit dat little angel o' light. Ef 
I kin wuck off all de stains what's on it by de time he's obleeged ter 
ca'y de Johnson part o' it out inter de worP, I'll praise Gord." 

The babe was nameless for a month. 

Finally, one Sunday, Antony came home from church jubilant. 
He had found the name to suit his fancy. The preacher had read it 
out of the Bible, and it had a sound of dignity that pleased him. It 
seemed to be filled with exhortation and warning and spirituality. 
It was " Lamentations of Jeremiah." 

The little babe winced visibly when, on the next Sabbath, the 
water of baptism was sprinkled on his unconscious head, and he 
became, whether he willed it or no, " Lamentations of Jeremiah John- 
son." 

No one ever had occasion to doubt the sincerity of Antony's con- 
version. It Avas a quiet facing about, an unemotional turning from 
sinful ways to a pure life. At first, the good people in the church 
were hardly satisfied with the " speritual evidences " in his case. They 
were disappointed. The man who had been the best dancer of the 
" double twis'," and could beat every man in the county " cutting the 
pigeon wing," would certainly throw some of this muscular vigor into 
the new life, and they had looked for great gymnastic spiritual mani- 
festations, so to speak, in his conversion. 

Perhaps religion in his case would even hallow the " pigeon wing," 
and sanctify the " double twis' " — who knew ? If Antony had worn 
a dazed visage and danced down the middle aisle in an extravagant 
" fling," his would have been considered a more pronounced conver- 
sion. One of the brothers even whispered his disappointment in 
church to a neighbor. " I shorely is disapp'inted," he said. " I 
'lowed dat maybe Brer Johnson would sort o' stipulate inter grace." 
But Brer Johnson did not "skipulate." There was nothing sensa- 
tional about his case. 

For eleven years Antony was a quiet, consistent Christian member 
of Chinquepin Chapel, and it is safe to say that the light of his quiet 
life did more to reform the morals of the congregation and to raise 
the standard of personal piety among them than did all the shouting 
and exhorting done in the chapel during that time ; and his death, 
occurring when Lamentations was eleven years old, produced a pro- 
found sensation. It was as the last years of his life had been — full of 
peace and a holy trust. The only time he was ever known to shout 
was with his passing breath, when, having invoked God's blessing on 
his little son, his spirit passed out through a smile on his lips, and he 
met the grim messenger with a clear though faint " Praise Gord ! " 



412 FICTION. 

After Antony's death, Priscilla gave up " crap-raisin' " and moved 
to town. She was a typical negro — improvident, emotional, gossipy, 
kind-hearted, high-tempered, vain, dishonest, idle, working two or 
three days in each week and " res'n' up " the remainder, with always 
a healthy appetite and a " mizrv in de bre's'." 

She had professed conversion several times, and as often become a 
backslider. The tips of her fingers led her easily into sin by fastening 
themselves to her neighbors' goods ; but this never brought her into 
open shame, as did the tips of her toes ; for Priscilla was an inveterate 
dancer, and, if a revival or camp-meeting drew her into the church, 
it took only a string band or a fiddle to work her ruin. Indeed, it 
became a by-word that " Sister Johnson shouted all winter and danced 
out o' grace at every May-day picnic." 

Such was Lamentations' mother. During the year of her widow- 
hood, as a visible means of support, she had done the family washing 
for Judge Williams and his wife ; and though the pay for so small an 
amount of work was proportionately small, there were perquisites, in 
the shape of a cabin rent free, " cold victuals," and sundry opportuni- 
ties for exercising the weakness of her finger-tips, which made the 
situation a desirable one. Her cabin — assigned to her on account of 
its proximity to the creek from which she washed — stood also conven- 
iently near the hen-house on one side and the vegetable garden on the 
other, while its one window opened over that dazzling, cooling, glow- 
ing, seductive temptation to the flesh — the watermelon patch ; and so, 
when Priscilla said that " Gord had been good to her, and she had no 
'casion to complain," she meant it. 

Lamentations, as we have said, was twelve years old when this 
story begins. Tall, black, unkempt, arrayed in ill-fitting frocks, with 
a falsetto voice and a stammering tongue, he was not a thing of 
beauty ; neither was he counted a joy, but rather a sorrow, in the 
village of Washington, Arkansas, in which he lived. If suspicion of 
any sort fell upon him, his appearance went far toward its confirma- 
tion, not only on account of his ugliness of person, but his peculiar 
dress gave him a sort of nondescript character, and seemed to brand 
him as an evil spirit. 

Priscilla's one maternal act had been sending him to school. The 
four months of tuition each year had been enough to make him a fair 
scholar, as scholarship went in the negro free school of Washington. 
His education was the one thing about him that his mother respected. 

It was vacation now. 

As he sat on guard to-day in the crotch of the fence, he seemed to 
fall into deep meditation. Ever and anon he cast an anxious glance 
in the direction of the sweet-gum tree, where, though out of sight, he 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH JOHNSON. 413 

knew his mother stood ; then he would gaze wistfully at a pair of 
trousers which lay bleaching on the grass. He was contemplating 
doing something which he feared to attempt. 

" Ef mammy was on'y a-washin' on de washboa'd, 'stid o' renchin' 
an' a-starchin', I could lis'en an' keep up wid her," he said. Finally, 
however, the temptation became too great. He slid quickly down 
from the fence, dropped the yellow dress on the ground, and pro- 
ceeded hastily to array himself in the judge's pantaloons, suspending 
them from the shoulders by means of the twine which he took from 
his whip. 

As the old judge was a short and over-fat man, the trousers were 
not much in the way of a fit. He now selected a vest from the 
ground, slipped his long black arms through the capacious arm-holes, 
buttoned it down the front, and, with his thumbs stuck into the 
pockets, began to strut up and down, surveying himself with evident 
pride. Oh, for a mirror ! He longed to behold himself in masculine 
attire. Glancing at the sun, he shifted his position, trying to see his 
own shadow, but the midday hour denied him even this unsubstantial 
gratification ; and so, satisfying himself with such a survey as he 
could get of his outline, he resumed his promenade, and began a half- 
audible soliloquy : " Dey ain't no use o' talkin' ! mannishness comes 
wid breeches ! Dey sort o' kin. I feels like I mought be de jedge dis 
minute. I shorely could 'spect myself in dese heah breeches, even ef 
dey warn't no tighter'n dese, jes so dey had laigs, an' was s'pendered 
up wid galluses ! I could ac' like a genterman ; an' as I is, I ain't 
nut'n' an' nobody. Ef I jes had sech as dese, I wouldn't be obleeged 
ter be a-spittin' terbacker an' a-sayin' cuss-words jes ter show what I 
is, like I does. I mought have some dignificatioms an' mannerfica- 
tioms an' " — 

His soliloquy was brought to a sudden close by a loud scream from 
the direction of the sweet-gum tree. It was his mother's voice. Lam- 
entations had become so absorbed in self -contemplation that a drove 
of hogs had passed behind him unobserved, leaving their footprints on 
the bleaching clothes. 

Their only exit lay at the end of the Cherokee hedge, a point near 
Priscilla, and she had taken the alarm. She knew that their familiar 
porcine hieroglyphs decorated her precious week's washing. 

At the sound of her voice, Lamentations turned and saw it all. He 
was terror-stricken. His first impulse was to get out of the judge's 
clothing, but haste embarrassed his motions. The twine " galluses " 
were knotted. 

Finally, just as his mother emerged from behind the hedge, the 
judge's apparel fell to the ground, and he stood before her trembling 



414 FICTION. 

— a pitiful nude statue of terror. His yellow dress lay just behind 
him. To take a backward step would expose the judge's trousers. 
Nearer and nearer came his mother ; still Lamentations moved not, 
neither did he speak. Finally Priscilla came to a halt, and looking at 
him in mingled anger and alarm, she began : 

" Fo' Gord's sake, what is you a-doin', a-standin' up heah in yo' 
skin, Lamentations o' Jeremiah Johnson ? " 

Lamentations began to cry. This indication of natural emotion 
fanned the flame of her ire, and she continued : 

" You is de onsettledes', ^o-'countes', beatenes', rapscalliones' nigger 
dat ever holped a po' sinner ter backslide ! You 'ain't got no mo' 
sperit 'n a suck-aig dorg ! What in kingdom come is you been doin' % " 
She approached a step nearer. " Is you gwine ter speak, you black 
buzzard % " 

Lamentations was too much frightened to speak. He made a des- 
perate leap in the direction of the yellow dress. Priscilla, thinking 
he was trying to escape, started and caught him. One of his feet had 
caught in the twine, and the judge's nether garments trailed after 
him, becoming more and more entangled about his legs as he danced 
around his mother, while she laid on blows thick and fast. Oh, the 
lamentations of Lamentations ! As the pantaloons, flying around, 
brought their own explanation, she became more and more excited, 
and beat him without mercy. It made no difference which way he 
turned. Every position presented a bare suggestion for another blow, 
and it came every time. 

Whether this beating provoked him to wrath, or his brief experi- 
ence in male apparel wrought an inspiration, we cannot say ; but a 
change came over Lamentations from this time. He became des- 
perate, and various depredations on hen-roosts and melon-patches, 
even beyond the judge's domain, were laid at his door. The wearer 
of the yellow dress became a familiar figure in court, but somehow 
he always managed to escape conviction. Finally, however, justice 
sought and found him at home. 

A pair of young Plymouth Rock hens disappeared one night from 
the roost ; and suspicion, confirmed by fresh footprints between the 
cabin and hen-house, and feathers corresponding with those of the 
missing chickens hidden in Priscilla's room, fell on the occupants of 
the cabin. 

The footprints were Lamentations's, but his mother had hidden the 
feathers. 

On inquiry, it transpired that, the night before, Priscilla had enter- 
tained a crowd of her church people on what she had been pleased 
to call " tucky-hain." Now, there were no turkey-hens on the prem- 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH JOHNSON. 415 

ises, and two fine Plymouth Rocks, nearly as large, were missing. 
Circumstantial evidence against them was strong. 

The judge had mother and son arrested and brought into court — 
his own court. 

Priscilla was called up first. She unblushingly denied the accusa- 
tion in toto, even weeping over the contemplation of such ingratitude 
as so base a theft would show. She dwelt at length upon the kind- 
nesses they daily received from the judge's family, and wept afresh 
over the sad lot of " a po' widderless 'oman an' a orphanless boy, wid 
nobody ter perfect 'em 'less'n it was de jedge, what knowed her po' 
daid husband," etc. Finally she swore to the truth of all this, and 
Lamentations was called. 

A murmur of suppressed mirth ran through the court as the tall, 
gaunt wearer of a white Swiss dress stalked gawkily upon the stand. 
Priscilla meant that her son should look his best on this important 
occasion, and had arrayed him in the Sunday frock of one of his 
departed sisters. It had belonged to one somewhat younger than 
Lamentations, and so the fluted ruffles came just to the knees, which, 
with his legs and feet, were bare. His sunburned hair, usually fluff- 
ing out like a mop, was now braided, and stood up in stiff spikes all 
over his head. He was nervous and embarrassed. Quickly repeating 
as nearly as he could the substance of his mother's testimony, he 
offered to swear to the truth of it. 

Before presenting the Bible, the judge took occasion to say a word 
on the sanctity of an oath, and even spoke kindly to the boy as he 
made a brief allusion to his old father, Antony. Now, the one thing 
sacred to Lamentations was the memory of his father. The judge 
bade him think well before laying his hand on the Holy Book, and 
handed him the Bible. In taking it, Lamentations's hand shook, and 
it fell upon the floor. It fell open. As the boy stooped to pick it up, 
he started— took hold of it — dropped it — and finally, trembling vio- 
lently from head to foot, he approached the judge, and made a full 
confession of the theft, humbly begging that he would not spare him, 
but punish him as he deserved. But the judge did spare him, sending 
both boy and mother home with only a wholesome admonition. 

This was the turning-point in Lamentations's life. 

The old judge, believing that his influence had brought the confes- 
sion, took a new interest in the lad, and the boy in dresses was called 
from the cabin in the rear lot to serve in the judge's family, and 
arrayed, at the age of thirteen years, in his first pair of " pants." 

Notwithstanding many faults of character, such as idleness and 
mischief, Lamentations never betrayed the trust of his benefactor. He 
was his father's son, and his reformation was honest and complete. 



416 FICTION. 

But this was fifteen years ago. Priscilla died in grace on the last 
day of April last year, and the May-day picnic was postponed that all 
the Chinquepin Chapel folk might do her honor. 

Lamentations still holds in the judge's family a position of trust. 
He is now also the pastor of Chinquepin Chapel — loved by his people 
and respected by all. 

Just after his appointment to this post I happened to be in the 
neighborhood, and knowing something of the young man's history, I 
went to hear his inaugural sermon. I was struck by his changed 
appearance. No longer a butt of ridicule in skirts did I behold, but a 
serious youth, reading from God's word, and exhorting the people to 
holier living. Briefly reviewing his life from his youth up, he finally 
approached the time of his conversion. 

As nearly as I can remember, his words were these : " I was buried 
an' steeped in sin, my bredren, an' every time I tried ter rise an' be a 
man in my father's image, somethin' holt me back, an' I 'lowed 'twas 
them frocks, which somehow seemed to keep me in my mother's image 
— not meanin' no disrespec's ter her, my bredren, but it ain't in nature 
fur a man ter 'spire when 'pearances is sot squarely ag'in 'im ; but I 
say now, ef dem gal clo'es stunted me in de sperit, it was becaze I was 
willin' 'ter he holt back, an' wasn't a-strivin' ter rise. But, my dear 
bredren, de day I was holten down de strongest, Gord callt me, an' I 
tell yer, my sistren an bredren, ef ever a mannish sperit was holten 
down by raiments an' adornments, my sperit was cramped dat day in 
dat white Swist frock ! I jes felt like I warn't no mo'n one o' dese heah 
sky-rockets — a heap o' show-ofnshness roun' a little black stick — an' I 
'lowed to myse'f dat I belonged ter de debble, an' I was ready ter say 
any false words what he put inter my mouf, when dat Bible fell on de 
flo'. An' when I stooped down ter pick it up, what yer reckin I see % 
Bless Gord ! I see my own name a-stanHrf on top d de page ! Yes, my 
dear bredren, on de top, an 1 in dese heah big letters ! Seemed at fust 
like I was struck bline, an' I heerd Gord a-callin' my name, ' Lamenta- 
tions o' Jeremiah ! ' an' de cote-house an' de jedge an' all de people 
faded outn my sight, an' I nuver felt dat Swist frock no mo'n ef it had 
o' been breeches, an' I seen my old daddy a-layin' on de baid, with his 
white haid on de piller, an' seemed like I heerd him a-prayin' ter Gord 
ter teck an' raise up dis heah po' little black chile ter wuck fo' him, 
an' ter be his faithful soljer an' servant ; an' oh, my bredren, I know 
den dat Gord done callt me — done callt me, an' showed me my name 
in de book ; and dar I stood, a ugly black varmint, all furbelowed up 
in gal finery, an' chuck-full dat minute d de jedge' s dominicker ! 
Seemed like I could see myse'f, an' I say ter myse'f, ' I ain't fitten ter 
'spond ter sech a call as dis.' An' a big lump riz up in my froat, big 



LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH JOHNSON. 417 

as a whole tucky-hain, but I knowed hit warn't de shubshance o' dat 
dominicker dat was a-chokin' me ; hit was de shubshance o' sin ! Hit 
was a-chokin' me, an' I spewed it outn my mouf , an' confessed de trufe, 
an' de lump went outn my naik, an' peace riz up in my soul ! " 

The " Amens ! " and " Glorys ! " came in thick and fast from the 
responsive congregation as Lamentations continued : 

" Yes, Gord call-t me, my bredren, an' showed me my name in de 
book ; but whar' bouts in de book? At de bottom o' de page? No ; 
he ain't lef me on de mo'ners' bench. In de middle o' de page ? No ; 
he 'ain't sot me in de mids' o' de corngergatiom. Den whar was it, 
my bredren ? Hit was on top d de page ! Gord done call-t me to de 
top — done stood me heah in de pulpit ; an' by his grace heah I is ! I 
tell yer, my bredren, some o' dese heah preachers is gradgerated f'om 
dishere college an' some f'om dat one, but I^s gradgerated f'ovi on 
high!" 

The excitement and enthusiasm were intense when I rose and 
quietly withdrew from the chapel, and as I walked homeward the 
words of the familiar hymn came to me : 

" God moves in a mysterious way 
His wonders to perform." 

The good old man Antony — densely ignorant, but honest in his con- 
viction — in the one act of faith that seemed most to betray the dark- 
ness of his mind, selected this extraordinary name for his son, and this 
act became the direct means of his reward, in calling his boy from 
death unto life. 

I say this confidently, for, after the test of fifteen years, the man 
most loved among the people, the one held most dear by the suffering, 
the sick, and the aged among his race, but the one especially known as 
the champion of all small boys, is Lamentations of Jeremiah Johnson. 



PART y. 
POETRY. 

SECTION I. DRAMATIC. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 
An Historical Tragedy in Five Acts. 

BY T. WHARTON COLLENS. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 

CREOLES. 



Lafreniere, Villere,* Aubry, Garidel, 

Adelaide, Mrs. Yillere, 

Denoyant, Milhet, Marquis, Carrere, 

Surgeon, A Creole Soldier, 

A Crowd of Citizens. 

SPANIARDS. 

Herald, First Judge, A Spanish Soldier, 
A Spaniard, A Scribe, Ruffian, Judges, Sailors, Soldiers. 

ACT I. 
Scene 1.— A public place {trees on the sides, a church in the background). 

[Lafreniere enters, holding an open letter. I 
Laf. {refers to his letter). 

Of v i ' T1S r?~'l iS well - these thi *gs will serve the cause 
Ol b reedom ; and though our mother spurns us 
From her bosom, we gain our Liberty 
By that unnatural deed. My country, 
My noble country, yes, thou shalt be free ! 
Thou ne'er canst brook the shame of slavery ; 
Thou wilt not tamely thus be bartered off. 
What ! sold like cattle ?— treated with disdain ? 
No ! Louisiana's sons can never bear 
Such foul disgrace. And when I'll tell them all, 
Of every insult, and the shame which thus 
This reckless King would heap upon their heads, 
'Twill put a burning fagot to their pride, 
'Twill blow their indignation into flame ; 
* Pronounced Vil-ra. 



422 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

And like the fire on our grass-grown plains, 

By raging winds devouring driven, 

'Twill spread, in blazing waves, e'en to the edge 

And utmost limit of the land ; and then, 

Proud Kings, beware ! lest e'en within the bounds 

Of Europe's slave-trod vales the blaze should catch, 

Sweep despots and their thrones away, and like 

Unprofitable weeds consume them all. 

Ay ! and how happy this occurrence ! 

'Twill aid my own ambitious views ; and while 

The cause of freedom prospers, so shall I. 

For 'tis my aim, in this young colony, 

To be the first among the free — to lead 

Them on in war, and rule by equal laws 

A land of liberty. Oh ! could I see 

The Independence of my native land, 

Myself its Liberator and its Chief — 

Not Caesar's glory nor his power would 

One moment be my envy. O lovely, 

Glorious picture of futurity 

Which now my young imagination draws 

In brilliant hues of glittering hope, 

Thou dazzlest e'en thy painter ! 

But Villere 
Comes not. I must tell him all my plans, 
And gain his sanction to them, or I fear 
They'll not succeed. In such respect are held 
His silvered head and sage advice, that once 
Unto me his adherence gained, most sure 
The people's warm approval I'll obtain, 
And all that hope doth promise soon possess. 
Ah ! but here comes my Adelaide. O love ! 
Thou hast a power which we cannot break ! 
But though thy chains are strong, and bind us tight, 
Yet they brace us up, and give us double strength 
For action ; and the bold hero oft achieves 
His noblest deed when ere the doubtful fight 
He kneels to thee. 

{Enter Adelaide.] 
Adelaide. Ah, Lafreniere, 

What brings thee out so soon ? The god of day 
Hath scarcely risen in the east, nor hath 
His morning rays as yet dissolved the drops — 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 423 

The diamond drops, which, shaken from the veil 
Of humid night, are sparkling in the rose, 
Or on the breast of some blue violet. 

Laf. How could I stay at home, my Adelaide, 
And, like an owl, hide myself from light, 
When, like the early lark, I fain would seek, 
Impatient to behold, thy sunny eyes, and bask 
Beneath their cheering beams ! 

Ade - Nay, but the owl 

Is Wisdom's chosen bird. Thou shouldst be wise, 
And copy her. 

Laf. I would be happy first. 

Ade. Smooth flatterer ! Enough of honeyed words 
Which sportingly, and with a cruel joy, 
Make but a plaything of a woman's heart. 
Tell me, what news from France ? Since early dawn 
My father seeks thee through the town. 'Tis said 
Thou hast late tidings of Lesassier. 

Laf - Kay, 

Sweet Adelaide— disturb not now thy soul 
With cares of politics, which 'tis the lot 
Of womankind, much happier than our own, 
Ne'er to be troubled with. 

Ade. Thou wrong'st our sex. 

Think ye that women have such hardened souls 
As not to feel their country's sufferings ? 
True, they mind not (as do some silly men) 
On which poor courtier kingly smiles are turned, 
Nor do they calculate each changing shade 
Of policy of jealous nations 'twixt 
Each other ; but when a woman sees 
That pending dangers, thickening round, 
Threaten the land where Heaven casts her lot, 
Then is each throb her father— brother— feels 
Keechoed in her breast. 

Laf - Well, let us hence 

Unto thy father's dwelling ; as we go, 
Thy gentle ear shall hear the painful news. 

[As Lafreniere and Adelaide go out, Aubry enters."] 
Aubry. Ay, there they go, smiling on each other- 
She with many looks of tender love, 
He with the gaze of conquering passion ; 
And I am left despised, without a hope 



424 POETR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

Save that of dire revenge ; and that I'll have, 

Cost what it may, ten thousand crimes, 

Toil, pain, and years of time. I'll persevere 

Until I tread upon his very neck, 

Nor yield, though seas of bitter tears are shed. 

I'll have a sacrifice of human blood 

Unto my hate paid up. And am I wrong ? 

He thwarts me daily at the council board, 

Kesists the plans I lay to serve and gain 

The favor of the Spanish Governor. 

His very reputation is my bane — 

It points invidiously at my own, 

And has more power in this colony 

Than I can claim as legal Governor. 

Ha ! here cometh one I have enlisted 

In my cause, and who doth serve me well. 

{Enter Garidel.] 
Ah, Garidel, I'm glad we meet to-day ! 
You find me in a flowing humor for our work. 
Hast thou performed the charge I gave thee \ 

Garidel. Yes— 

I put the letter on her toilet table. 

Aub. Well, what result % 

Gar. None — she has not seen it. 

But prithee, Master Aubry, why not use 
Some means more certain in effect to part 
These foolish lovers ? These letters, well wrought 
And plausible, 'tis true, can they reduce 
Love's hottest flame % They may cause some pouting ; 
But oaths and tears soon quell the anger raised 
By cloaked accusers 'gainst the one we love. 

Aub. 'Tis well to try this method first ; and then, 
If not successful, I have other plans. 

Gar. And they are ? 

Aub. Listen, Garidel. Art thou 

An honest fellow, and can I be sure 
That if I give thee all my confidence, 
Thou'lt not deceive me % 

Gar. What, Master Aubry, 

And do you ask me that ? But yesterday 
We did acknowledge to each other 
That nature round our hearts had wound a tie 
Of sympathy. Have you not often said, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769 425 

That, in the darkness of my brow, there was 
A something most congenial to thyself ? 

Aub. But answer, wilt thou aid me against Villere, 
And Villere's house to all extremity \ 

Gar. Pshaw ! 

Do not anger me. Have I not advised 
The use of stronger measures 'gainst them % True, 
Villere has been a father to me. 
He found me, when an infant, in a ditch, 
Thrown there by an inhuman mother. 
He picked me up, and had me nursed with care, 
And, cheated by the fairness of my skin, 
He thought me one of Europe's sickly race, 
And did adopt me as his son, and strove 
To teach me science and morality. 
But now I am among his servants classed ; 
For soon as I grew up my figure changed ; 
And this black hair, and eye, and bronzed face 
Proclaimed me one of that dread tribe of men 
Whose birthplace is the undivided wild, 
Whose law is in the power of their arms, 
Whose hate is trusted to a poisoned knife, 
Whose thirst is for the white man's blood, 
And whose ambition is to sweep away 
Those pale usurpers of this land 
Who seek to pen the freeborn Indian up 
And set a bound' ry to his roving steps. 
Listen, Aubry ! I feel as if the red man's God 
Had cast my lot amidst thy race to be 
An agent of our nation's vengeance. 
Think ye I'll shrink from such a sacred task ? 
Though Villere still should call me his own son, 
I would begin with him. I'll end, perhaps, 
With you. 

Aub. With me ! 

Gar. Nay, speak not of yourself, 

But parley to your purposes. You have 
My service now ; use it while you may. 

Aub. {aside). A dreadful fellow this ; but I must bend 
Awhile unto his temper. 
{To Garidel.) Well, I see 

Thou art the man I sought for, Garidel. 
I'll trust thee to the whole. Listen ! If I fail 



42 6 POE TR Y—DRA MA TIC. 

To gain my end by superstition's aid ; 
If calumny, with her venom, don't succeed 
In turning their sweet loves into bitter 
Jealousy — why, Garidel, I'll then attack 
That very beauty which enslaves my heart 
And causes all my pain ; ay, and to which 
Lafreniere kneels. I swear by Heaven 
I'll destroy it, and what / could not gain 
No other man shall feast upon. Look here ! 
This vial holds a subtle poison 
Which, rubbed against the rose and lily 
Of her face, will raise it full of blots 
And biles, ulcers and putrid sores — make her 
Disgusting to every one around her, 
And even to herself. Tell me ; think ye 
He'll love her then ? 

Gar. {taking the vial). Trust it to my hands. 
/ will apply it. But is its venom sure ? 
Say, from what propitious fiend of hell 
Did you the drug procure ? 

Aub. From that old witch, 

That bride of Lucifer, the fortune-teller 
Who lives midst the miasmas of the swamp. 
Do you not know her ? 

Gar. No ; but tell me 

How to find her ; for, if she sells such drugs 
As this, her traffic might be profited 
By my acquaintance. 

Aub. Near the rotting trunk 

Of that dead cypress tree which stands, 
Like a giant skeleton, behind the common 
Burial ground, without the city, 
Her hut she has erected. It seems a heap 
Of half -burned logs, and boards, and earth 
Thrown there by accident. She chose the spot 
For it is solitary, and near the fens 
Where toads, and snakes, and poisonous weeds 
Are trod upon at every step. 'Tis near 
The graves and crumbling tombs from whence she gets 
Most fit ingredients for the hellish spells 
She deals in. The day she gave me that, 
I found her in her low and dingy cabin 
Crouched on the humid earth — watching, 



TEE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 427 

"With a curious care, some working spell 
Which crackled 'midst the smoking embers. 
A reddened light fell o'er the African ; 
Her twisted hair, white as a maiden's shroud, 
Contrasted with her ebon skin ; and her limbs, 
Shrivelled by age, were but half covered 'neath 
Some filthy, partly -colored rags. 
A laugh, which sounded like a tiger's growl ; 
A smile, as when he shows his bloody teeth — 
Her heavy lips relaxed, while, searching mine, 
She raised her serpent eyes. I tremble 
Even now. 

Gar. And I rejoice. 

Aitb. By Heaven ! 

How can I reward thee ? 

Gar. Teach me more crimes — 

They give me joy enough ! Continue on ; 
Detail your full intention unto me. 
What would you do 'gainst Yillere, and 'gainst young 
Laf reniere ? I pant to deal with men. 

Aub. {taking a dagger from his bosom). Here is a dagger I 
would trust with thee ; 
Its point is more envenomed than the bite 
Of any serpent in thy native woods. 
If thou couldst only touch them with its point — 
They die, and I am happy. 

Gar. (lakes the dagger). I take it, 
And will do the deed ; and though, with prudence, 
You have steeped the dagger's point in poison, 
Yet the wise precaution shall be useless ; 
For, when I strike the oppressors of my race, 
The blow shall reach their hearts. 

Aub. Hush ! be careful ! 

Yillere approaches. 

[Miter Yillere.] 
Ah! Sir Yillere, 
We meet in proper time. This way I came 
To give you notice, that, at twelve to-day, 
The council meets ; and }^ou, of course, must come : 
For your opinions, ever wise, will aid us much 
In acting on the matters strange we must 
Discuss to-day, 

Yil. Whatever wisdom, sir, 



428 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Heaven may have endowed me with 

Is at the service of the colony. 

But tell me, sir, what strange occurrence this, 

Which is so greatly to engage our minds ? 

Aub. Excuse me, sir ; this public place ill suits 
The tale. Already have seditious men 
Summoned the crowd to meet them here, and soon 
The hour fixed will strike. Adieu, sir ; 
We shall expect you. 

{Exit Aubry and Garidel severally. 

Yil. Strange this, 

The people and the council both — 

{Enter Lafreniere.] 

Laf. Father, 

For thus I love to call thee — 

Yil. Lafreniere, 

What stir is this, my son ? Why is this 
Meeting of the people called ? 

Laf. Ah, Yillere, 

I have got such news 'twill turn your blood 
To fire. What think ye — France — France has spurned us, 
She has disowned us ! We have lost the name — 
The glorious name of Frenchmen. 

Yil. What ! 

Has the King refused our prayer ? 

Laf. Ay, insists 

That he will sell us like a gang of slaves, 
And give us the treacherous Spaniard 
For a master. 

Yil. Can it be so % O France ! 

How couldst thou treat thy children thus ? But say, 
Lafreniere, is there no hope remaining ? 

Laf. None but in ourselves. 

Yil. Speak, what can we do ? 

Laf. Have we not freeborn souls, stout hearts, 
And sinewy arms ? 

Yil. We have ; what then ? 

Laf. What ! dost thou ask it % Can we stand thus, 
With folded arms, and with our swords still sheathed, 
And see our country trampled in disgrace — 
Sold to a Spanish tyrant, be made 
Spanish slaves — and not a single effort make 
To gain our liberty % 



THE MART YE PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 429 

Vil. Liberty % 

Laf. Ay, Liberty ! 

The word sounds strangely in your ear ; but soon 
"Will come a day, when, after father, mother, God, 
That word will be the first one taught 
To prattling babes ; and even now 
I'd have it make each brave Louisianian 
Thrill with a godlike sentiment, 
And like the electric shock 
Strike to his ardent soul, and wake him up 
To deeds of honor and renown. 

Yil. But do I understand thee well ? 
Ha ! hast thou pleased thy fancy with a dream 
Of Greek republics, or of a Eoman commonwealth % 

Laf. Then must slavery be our choice. 
Would ye have us bear the yoke of Spain, and 
Call her tyrant our king and master, and 
Her treacherous sons our countrymen ? 

Yil. Ah, much rather would I die than bear 
Such shame. 

Laf. And why not rather then be free ? 

There is no middle stand between two. 
Ungrateful France has bartered us away ; 
We should from her ask help no more ; but now 
Must pass from one proud master to another, 
Or rise at once like men, and boldly strike 
For freedom. 

Yil. I fear, my son, that thou art right. 

But be exact. What are thy plans % 

Laf. Already 

Have I sent Garidel around, to call 
Together our most worthy citizens. 
I would have them, now, disclaim all foreign 
Power, govern themselves ; and take up arms 
Should France or Spain invade the land. 

Yil. But stay, 

Laf reniere, dost thou not dread a failure ? 

Laf. I dread dishonor more. 

Yil. We are few, and all 

Undisciplined. 

Laf. Our cause is just. That — and 

An able leader — will insure us victory. 

Yil. But France and Spain are powerful ; they'll pour 



430 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Upon us armies, fleets. Could we resist 
Such mighty strength as theirs ? 

Laf. Well, should we fail, 

What then ? We will have done our duty ; 
But should we yield without a struggle, 
Not only chains we'll bear, but fame will brand us — 
Cowards ! 

Yil. Thou hast gained me ; and now with thee 
This compact do I make — to fight, and die 
Or triumph by thy side. 

Laf. Come, let us haste 

And make some preparation for the meeting. 

\Exit Lafreniere and Villere. 
[Miter Denoyant, Milhet, Marquis, and Carrere.] 
Denoy. 'Tis my opinion that our deputation 
Will meet with full success. Louis can never 
Thus abandon his faithful subjects, 
And his richest province in the western world. 

Car. Well, I confess I have strong doubts ; 
'Tis probable, I think, that all our hopes 
Will be deceived, and that the Spaniard 
Will reign in Louisiana yet. 

Denoy. Never ! 

Were I but sure that such a day would come, 
I'd quit my native land, home, and possessions — 
All — and hie me to some distant shore, 
Where I'd not see nor even hear it told. 

Milh. For me, far rather would I drain this heart 
Of all the blood that rushes to it now, 
Than see my country for one moment suffer 
Such foul disgrace. 

Marq. And I reecho that, 

If e'er a Spanish tyrant treads on me, 
'Twill be upon a lifeless corpse. 

Car. Well, well ! That 

Such sentiments are highly noble 
I don't deny. But are they not in vain ? 
Resistance will serve us nothing ; we must 
Be conquered. Should we take up arms, 
Our stubbornness will but increase 
The tyrant's rancor. 

\During the dialogue Crowds of Citizens enter from every side .] 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 431 

Marq. Here comes Lafreniere. 

{Enter Lafreniere and Villere.] 

( Voices.) What news ? what news ? 

Laf. Fellow-citizens, most painful tidings 
Do I bring you. All, all our hopes are crushed. 
A letter from our friend Lesassier, 
Chief of the deputation we have sent 
To lay our griefs before the King, and beg 
The revocation of the shameful treaty 
Of which we have such reason to complain, 
Informs me he could not even reach 
The royal presence — that the ministers 
Refuse to listen to our just demands, 
And that we, at our gates, may soon expect 
A Spanish army. 

( Voices.) Shame ! What degradation ! 

Laf. My friends, there is not one of you, I hope, 
Whose soul feels not its indignation rise, 
And all its anger conflagrated burn, 
To hear of the high contempt with which 
Licentious Louis treats our prayer. Countrymen, 
Shall our native land, our honors and our lives, 
Be humbled to strange laws — laws 
Made by tyrants and by slaves enforced ? 

( Voices.) No, never. 

Denoy. What can we do ? 

Laf. I'd have ye 

Take up arms — yes, die or triumph — 
And never yield submission to the yoke. 
When ills have reached their last extremity, 
Despair must give the remedy that cures 
Their strong intensity. 

Car. Can we resist 

Our pending fate ? Can we contend 'gainst Spain's 
Unnumbered hordes ? 

Laf. Why ask ye not if hearts 

We have, of temper bold and brave, and souls 
Which labor to be free ? Why count ye numbers ? 
Say, do ye fear to die, or care ye if 
Your death doth come from one or from 
Ten thousand hands ? 

Vil. I think Lafreniere right. 

Our numbers are but few, but still we may, 



432 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

By courage and determination, intimidate 
Spain's mercenary hordes and free our shores 
From vile pollution. 

Makq. My life, my fortune, 

Freely would I give, to save my country 
From this bondage. 

Denoy. And I ! 

Milh. And I ! 

Cab. And I ! 

Laf. My countrymen ! I knew ye could not brook 
This much-detested change. Soon would our 
Patriot breasts be strangers in the land 
Where once they breathed their natal air, 
If we should try to join the variance wide 
Which parts us from the arrogant Spaniard. 
His morals, manners, character, all vary 
From our own. Frenchmen will now disown us ; 
Spaniards we can never be, nor Englishmen ; 
But shall we be without a name ? Of what 
Nation will ye call yourselves \ Old Europe 
Has not a name to fit ye. Then let our 
Country be Louisiana ! Let's be Americans ! 

Citizens. Yes, yes ! Americans ! 

I, Ar Ay, that's a name 

That will be ours ; that none can take away. 
Already has the cry of liberty * 
Kesounded in the North. The colonies 
Of Britain, the thirteen provinces, have risen 
'Gainst a despot's tyranny ; already 
Has their blood flowed in the sacred cause. 
Let's mix our blood with theirs, 
And doubtless victory will coronate 
The sacred pact. The Indian will help us ; 
For he has heard, e'en in the trackless woods, 
Of mines, where Indians find a living tomb ; 
Of all the Inquisition's horrors dark ; 
Of blood-stained Gothic institutions, and 
Of feudal slavery. Let us resist, I say ! 
Kemember well, that Fortune's favored ones 
Are noble, daring in audacious bravery. 

* At this time the Americans made a show of resistance to the Stamp Act. The 
sentiment was, in fact, spoken by Laf reniere. See Gayarre's Louisiana. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 433 

Citizens. We'll not submit ! No, never ! never ! 
[Enter Garidel.] 

Gar. The Spaniards have reached our shores ! A fleet 
Bearing in it full five thousand men sails 
Swiftly up the river. 

Laf. Now ! now, 

My countrymen ! now is the time to prove 
Our firm resolve ! Let us haste and arm, and 
Drive them back as we did the ignoble 
Don Ulloa ! Soon must we give our liberty 
Its baptism of blood ! Prepare to die or be 
Triumphant ! Ay, let's take a sacred oath — 
A solemn pledge, of victory or death ! 
Swear, countrymen ! to die or to be free ! 

Citizens {simultaneously stretching out their right hands). We 
swear ! 

ACT II. 

Scene 1. — The Council Chamber. Aubry, Villere, Milhet, Denoy- 
ant, Marquis, Carrere, and other members of the council siiti/ng 
round a table. 

Aub. Gentlemen, matter of great consequence 
Unites us here to-day in grave debate. 
Deliberate measures must we take, and 
Prudence more than anything to-day should guide 
And dictate all our actions. No reckless 
Resolutions, or undertaking rash, 
By us adopted, should this fair province, 
And ourselves, in risks and danger plunge. 
You have already been informed that this 
Fair colony has, by our gracious King, 
Louis the beloved, been surrendered 
Unto his Majesty the sovereign Charles 
Of Spain. I need not tell you of the greatness, 
The clemency and wisdom, of this prince. 
Obedience to him is our duty. 
Long have I waited with impatience, 
That o'er us should begin his rule. At last 
My longing wishes are all satisfied. 

[Enter Lafreniere, who remains in fronts 



434 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

O'Reilly, with full powers from his King, 

Ascends the river and will soon be here. 

'Tis true, that moved by futile hope, and strong 

Attachment for the mother country, 

Our citizens did drive good Don Ulloa 

From their native shore ; but of this wrong deed 

They have, I hope, repented. Ambitious 

Factions and discontented men, I know, 

Have, by their cunning and exciting speeches, 

Stirred their noble spirits to rebellion ; 

But quick submission will, I hope, soon show 

That 'tis but a moment's aberration 

Which leads them thus, with folly, to disown 

The will and power of their rightful king. 

Laf. {aside). Base hypocrite ! lying traitor ! 

Vil. ' Indeed! 

Your Excellence will pardon me, if my 
Opinion differs from your own. I think 
Our citizens are not thus unsteady ; 
Nor are they guided by a blind caprice. 
What they have done, was calmly done, and not 
In headlong haste. They have resolved to rise, 
And desperate resistance to oppose 
To the invading horde ; and their honor 
They have pledged, at price of blood, to save 
Their country from oppression. 

Laf. {aside). Ay, tremble, 

Ye traitors, for they'll keep that sacred oath. 

Aub. Much does it hurt me to confess the great 
Displeasure I do feel, Sir Villere, now 
To find that you, whose discreet judgments have 
So often shed benignant influence o'er 
This council board, should thus have joined the voice, 
The raging of the factious few, whose acts, 
Thoughtless and criminal, ere long might bring 
An evil scourge upon Louisiana, 
And on themselves complete destruction. 

Laf. {aside). God ! 

Restrain me, or I'll kill the wretch ! 

Aub. • Remember, 

Villere, that when the Mississippi's wave, 
With mighty force, and waters running high, 
Threatens to crumble down our feeble dykes, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 435 

The prudent planter seeks to prop the banks 

Or mend, the widening breach. I fondly thought 

That you, in this event, would seek to set 

The barrier of your wisdom up against 

The unruly current of this folly — 

This rash presumption which menaces now 

To sweep you with it, and destroy you. 

Laf. {aside). Oh, the bribed scoundrel ! 

Vil. Aubry, I care not 

How soon this white head of mine is felled ; still 
Persist I in my first opinion. Wisdom, 
You say, has until now her breath infused 
Into my words ; she has not quit my side. 
No factious counsel have I given ; but 
The people — the whole people — have arisen, 
And Spain's mercenaries shall dye their swords 
In Creole blood, and tread upon an host 
Of slain, before they gain the city's walls. 

Denoy. Ay, Aubry ; and I have joined them too, and 
Have pledged my honor also with the rest ; 
And to redeem the promise I have made, 
My sword must triumph in the battle, or 
My life be paid a tribute to the grave. 

Milh. And mine ! 

Marq. (to Aubry). Sir, we'll never yield ! 

Denoy. No, never. 

Aub. Gentlemen ! This is rebellion — treason ! 
France has made a formal resignation — - 

Car. I do deny the right — 

Denoy. We all deny it. 

Aub. The people here cannot assume a voice. 

Laf. (to Aubry). Thou liest, dog ! The people will assume 
That right— 

Milh. Yes, and they'll maintain it too ! 

Laf. Ah ! hear you that, your Excellence ? Thought ye 
These men were bought by dirty Spanish gold ? 
You've called them traitors — you are the traitor ! 
Do you not hold a correspondence close 
With the governor of Havana, say ? 
And sent you not unto the court of Spain 
The names of those who led the noble band 
Which drove proud Don Ulloa from our shore ? 
I tell you, Aubry, you are the traitor. 



436 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Aub. Gentlemen, do you suffer this ? 

Laf. Suffer ! 

Do you appeal to them ? Go, call your friends, 
The treacherous Spaniards. 

Aub. I'll call my guard. 

I'll have you all arrested. {The members rise and draw.) 

Laf. What! — guard! arrest! 

I do defy you to attempt it. Ha ! 
Pronounce one word, and round us I will bring 
The assembled city, all up in arms, 
To tear thy worthless soldiery to pieces, 
And destroy thee with them. 

Aub. {softening). Excuse me, sirs, 

But 'twas my duty which commanded me. 
I meant no insult, nor was I in earnest — 

Laf. {to Aubnj). Silence ! 

{To the members.) Gentlemen ! The people send me to you. 
My message is, that they have made me chief, 
And all authority have placed in me, 
Until invaders shall no more pollute 
The air we breathe. This council is dissolved ; 
And you, my friends, it is expected, will 
Unite your strength with ours, to repel 
The horde of bandits who, advancing fast, 
Approach with angry cries our walls. 

y IL# "Whate'er 

Our fellow-citizens ordain, we'll do. 

Denoy. And we are happy, Lafreniere, that you 
Have been selected to command. 

Milh. Success 

Is thus insured. 

Marq. And confidence inspired. 

Aub. I do protest against this whole proceeding. 
It is illegal. 

Laf. {to Aubry). Silence, I tell thee, thou perfidious 
Coward. 

{To the members.) My friends, it is my ardent wish 
That your great trust in me should be maintained. 
All my best energies I'll use to gain 
The franchise we aspire to. The aid 
Of your advice, good gentlemen, will be 
Of great assistance to me, and I hope 
That 'twill be given with profusion. Come, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 437 

Let us haste ; our forces must be formed. 
And we must march to-night. 

[Exeunt Lafreniere, Villere, and members* 
Aub. A coward ! yes, 

I know I am a coward ; but, rash youth, 
With all thy bravery, I'll overcome thee. 
Ay ! trust thee to honor, strength, and courage. 
Cunning will overset thee with a straw. 
Aubrv will teach thee lessons so severe 
They'll make you feel as a well-punished child 
Scorching 'neath his tutor's whip. I'll teach him, 
Young, presuming dog ! to know his fellow-men — 
Their falsehood, and the little trust to place 
In all their oaths and protestations loud. 
To-morrow's dawn shall ope to disappoint 
His proud ambition and his brilliant plans. 

Scene 2. — Adelaide's apartment. 
{Enter Garidel.] 

Gar. 'Tis now my glowing Indian blood doth flow 
"With all its vigor through my beating veins. 
How high it leaps at thoughts of gratified 
Kevenge ! {Holds up the vial of poison.) All hail, thou elixir of 

hell! 
Poison to her, and balm to me for every wound 
Inflicted by her father. Now's the time — 
No one observes me — none will dare suspect. 

(Takes up) a vial from the toilet table.) 
This is her favorite essence ; 'tis the 
Sweet cologne of wide reputed virtue — 
Its purity unsullied as descending dew, 
Its odor fragrant as a garden's breath, 
Its healing power most miraculous. 

(Pours the vial of poison into it.} 
Neither its odor nor its color change. 
Thou God ! it will succeed ! Ha ! how she'll look ! — 
Her beauty gone and horror in its place ! 
I see her raving at its loss ; and he, 
Distracted by the dreadful blow, shall writhe 
Beneath the vengeful stroke. Her father, too ! — 
Ha ! how he will feel it, when this goddess — 



438 POETRY— DRA31AT1C. 

This queen of beauty he so dotes upon, 

Will fall upon his neck all withered o'er 

By sullying disease ! Ha ! and perhaps 

He'll shrink away, and dread to kiss that cheek 

On which so often he has pressed the lip — 

The fervent lip, of warm parental love. 

Ah ! and her mother — what will she do ? Oh, 

She will die ! For 'tis beyond conception 

That she should bear the dreadful agony 

That this will bring upon her. They come — 

I must not here be seen. O happy hour ! 

Brim full of secret pleasure. {Exit Garidel. 

{Enter Adelaide and Mrs. Villere.] 

Mrs. Vil. My Adelaide, 

Thy choice, indeed, doth satisfaction give 
To thy fond mother. Of all the noble 
Youths who crowd to catch one softened ray 
From those bright eyes of thine, more worthy none 
Than young Lafreniere is to be thy lord ; 
His form is cast in manly beauty's mould, 
His heart is virtue's richest, purest gem, 
His mind a palace genius lighteth up. 

Ade. Ah, mother, thou dost almost flatter him. 

Mrs. Vil. Faultless, I do not say he is. 

Ade. Some faults 

He has ; but, like clouds around the sun, 
They're gilded over by the shining rays 
Cast from the brightness of his qualities, 
And only serve to give a high relief 
To all the splendor of his virtue. 

Mrs. Yil. Say, 

Think ye not he is presumptuous ? 

Ade. No, no. 

Presumption is, I think, the distance 'tween 
What men themselves believe to be the worth, 
The virtue, talent, power, they possess, 
And what their real value is. Pray, then, 
To what has young Lafreniere yet pretended 
In which he overprized himself ? 

Mrs. Vil. Thou dost 

Defend him well, and with an eloquence 
Near equal to his own. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 439 

Ade. My heart doth prompt it, 

(Trumpets, drums, and shouts are heard without, distantly '.) 

Mrs. Yil. Hark to these sounds ! 

Ade. {opening a window). See, mother, 'tis the proud 

Array of war ; and, while we talk of love, 
Our youths abandon now their chosen fair, 
And court the favor of less tender dames : 
Glory and carnage, and bright liberty, 
Are now the mistresses to whom they bow, 
And deck their forms in warlike garb to woo. 
Think, mother, that our verdant fields will soon 
In gory streams be soaked ; and that many friends 
We love, 'neath hostile swords may sink. Ah ! think, 
That my father, too, may fall amidst the fight, 
Pouring his life-blood on his native soil — 
Dying — all gashed and pierced and trampled o'er 
By charging horses and the reckless feet 
Of rushing thousands. (The noises are repeated.) 

Mrs. Yil. Ah ! my Adelaide, 

Thou bringest on me thoughts which shake my soul 
E'en to its inmost dwelling. 

[Miter Yillere.] 

Ade. Father ! 

Mrs. Yil. Husband ! 

Yil. My wife — my child ! 

Mrs. Yil. Yillere, 

I read my fate already in thine eye. 
Thou art called to risk thy life, so precious 
To our hearts, in battle's dreadful fury. 
And must we now, when years of quiet and 
Content have blessed our union, part with fear 
Of never meeting more ? 

Yil. Not so, my spouse. 

Let not thus fear victorious hold the sway 
Of thy true heart. Let rather pleasing hopes 
Dispel thy cloudy bodings of the future. 
No share to me is granted in the fight 
"Which is to fix my country's destiny ; 
And, though I begged a station to obtain 
In its defenders' ranks, my prayer was vain. 
Lafreniere, whom the people have appointed 
Leader, sends me amongst the settlements 
To call in all Louisiana's force, 



440 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

And gain the succor of our red allies. 

From thence, in haste, I'll wend my lengthened way 

To ask assistance of that noble race 

Who dwell along Atlantic's western shore, 

And who are now, in proud array, opposed 

To proud Britannia's tyranny. 

Mrs. Vil. Thanks to Lafreniere for this happy care. 
Much will I try, the pleasure now he gives 
This sorrowing breast, in double fold to pay. 

Ade. But, father, dost thou leave us e'en to-day ? 

Vil. Yes, all is ready, and I go e'en now ; 
My steed awaits me at the gate. 

Mrs. Vil. My love, 

Why haste you thus ? Oh, wait until the morn ! 
Stay with us yet this day. 

Vil. Each minute counts. 

Come, then, embrace thy husband e'er he goes. {They embrace.) 
My country needs the promptest services, 
And I must fly upon the wings of haste. 
My daughter, go, tell Garidel prepare 

To start upon this voyage with me. [Exit Adelaide. 

Come, my love, be not depressed. I'll send thee news 
Of all that doth befall me as I go. 

Mrs. Vil. And must it then be so % But, Villere, say, 
Wilt thou be absent long ? 

Vil. But six short weeks 

Will suffice for my duty. I'll then return ; 
And Heaven grant I find my country free, 
The Spaniards beaten, and untroubled peace 
Around our happy fireside ! And then, 
My wife, the long retarded union of 
Our child with Lafreniere once solemnized, 
In tranquil solitude we'll pass the days 
Of our last years. 

[Reenter Adelaide.] 

Ade. Father, thy bidding's done ; Garidel is ready. 

Vil. I thank thee, child ; 

But come before thy father goes, and take his blessing. 

{lie kisses her forehead, and she kneels.) 
My daughter, Heaven bless thee, 
Ward off all dangers from this lovely head, 
Keep thy fragile frame from pain or sickness, 
Preserve thee to console my coming age, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 441 

And make thee thy Lafreniere's worthy bride. (She rises.) 

Remember oft thy father ; in thy prayers, 

Each eve and morn, send up to God's high throne 

An earnest supplication for success 

To all his labor, and his safe return. 

Ade. Oh ! could I forget that duty, father ? 
Oh, may my faint petition reach the ear 
Of Him who holds our fate within His hand ! 
He'll not refuse what asks a guileless heart : 
He'll shield thee, father, and will keep thee for us. 

Mrs. Vil. Nay, go not yet. 

Vil. Indeed, I must depart. 

My country calls. Adieu! (They embrace cmdpa^t.) 

Ade. Adieu ! 

Mrs. Vil. Adieu ! {Exit Villere. 

Ade. O mother, I am faint ! This unforewarned 
Departure of my father striketh hard 
Upon my heart, and makes me feel quite sick. 

Mrs. Vil. (wetting her kerchief from the vial). Here, my 
daughter, here ; respire this, my love, 
And pour it o'er thy cheeks, and neck, and temples ; 
'Twill spur the blood that stoppeth in thy veins. 

[As Mrs. Villere gives the kerchief and vial to her daughter, Garidel 

enters^ 
Gar. (aside). Ha! 

(To Mrs. Villere.) 

Dear madam, I come to bid adieu 
To you and kind Miss Adelaide. 

Mrs. Vil. Thank thee, 

Garidel, for this attention. Good-by. 
I wish thee a pleasant voyage, and hope 
That nought but good will come across thy path. 

Gar. Thank thee, good lady ; but is Miss Adelaide 
Unwell ? — she looks quite pale. 

Ade. , A little faint — 

'Tis nothing — this will drive it soon away. 
But, Garidel, take good care of father — 
Let nothing do him harm. 

Gar. Long as this arm 

Can move, it shall be lifted to protect 
My benefactor. Adieu ! (Garidel shakes the hands of both.) 

{Exit Garidel. 



442 POETR Y—DRA MA TIC. 

Mrs. Yil. Indeed, 

Garidel is well worthy of the care 
That on him Yillere has bestowed ; but say, 
My daughter, art thou still unwell ? 

Ade. "lis past — 

I'm quite recovered. 

Mrs. Vil. "Well, then, I leave thee ; 

I have some duties to attend to. {They kiss.) 

{Exit Mrs. Yillere.] 

Ade. Ah ! 

How full of pain this hour is, and how 
My feeble heart doth throb with suffering ! 

(Sees a letter on the toilet.) 
Ah, a letter ! — "lis addressed to me. What can 
It be % {Opens it and reads.) " Adelaide, thy love's bestowed 
On one unworthy ; and the hot passion 
He pretends, a false heart disguises. 
His high ambition and his secret plans 
Force him to seek an union which will gain 
A strong support to all his wild designs. 
And, lady, though he feels no spark of love, 
Yet still he woos thee for thy name, and will 
Perhaps e'en yet sufficient power have 
To make thee spurn the warning of a friend." 
Ah ! can this be true, or is it calumny ? 
O Laf reniere, couldst thou deceive me thus ? 
Oh, double blow of pitiless misfortune ! 
{Enter Lafreniere.] 

Laf. Ah, Adelaide ! thou seem'st unwell, my love. 
Say, what weighs thee down so heavily ? 
What ! is't on me thy angry frowns are bent ? 
What have I done to merit such reception % 

Ade. Leave me this instant, sir ! 

Laf. Nay, say not so. 

Thou art not serious, Adelaide. Ah, 
That blush which doth suffuse thy lovely cheek 
Methinks doth tell another tale ! 

Ade. Blush, sir! 

The red that rose upon my brow doth mark 
My great displeasure at the sight of thee. 

Laf. Heaven ! what crime have I committed ? 

Ade. Say, 

Art thou not false, and is not Ambition 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 443 

The only dame whose favors thou dost court 
When thou dost kneel to me ? 

Laf. 'Tis true I am 

Ambitious ; but, my Adelaide, I swear 
Thou'rt joined with my ambition's brightest dream ; 
And laurels, riches, fame, I'd cast away 
As childish baubles, nor would I aspire 
To aught above the name of honest man, 
Did I not think to share these things with thee. 

Ade. Most bravely, frankly, said ; and thou too canst 
Thine honor and thy truth both lay aside 
With her whose weakness ye'd beguile. Sir, 
I have friends who o'er my welfare watch, 
And whose kind care detected have thy plans — 
Thy wily, base, ungenerous plots. 

Laf. (kneeling). Upon my knees I pray thee, Adelaide, 
Tell me what whim is this. What black falsehood 
Hast thou heard which makes thee doubt, what ne'er 
Until to-day hath been impeached by woman or 
By man — Lafreniere's honor ? 

Ade. Ay, 'tis thus 

With all your sex : ye kneel and cringe ; 
With cheating words, and oaths, and promises, 
And whining prayers, ye do triumph o'er 
Our unsuspecting hearts ; and when we own 
Your power, and our love — to masters change ; 
Poor feeble woman's duty then becomes 
To watch each caprice of a tyrant's will — 
Live in his smile and wither 'neath his frown. 

Laf. {who has risen). Lady, I've done. Thou'lt hear from me 
no more 
Words prompted by my passion's ardor. Yet 
Do not think the fire that burns within 
This breast will cease to burn. Though smothered, 
'Twill not die, and, thus confined, 'twill torture 
None but me. My countrymen await me. 
Oh, may I lead them unto victory, 
And may /meet with death ! {Exit Lafkeniere. 

Ade. What have I done ? 

Why did I not show him this ? — Laf — Ah, no ! 
I must not call him back ; he would exult 
As in a victory. Proud of the strong 
Seductions of his mien and eloquence, 



444 POETR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

He'd look upon me as a conquered slave. 

No, no : I'm full of love, yet I'm as proud 

As he. Ah, my mother ! To thee 111 haste 

For consolation to my stricken breast. {Exit. 

Scene S.—A Wood (Night). 
{Enter Aubry, accompanied by Ruffians.] 

Aub. Yes ; this is the place fixed by Garidel — 
His note describes it well. Go ye and hide 
Behind these trees ; and, when I the signal give, 
Rush on Sir Villere — ye know him all. Mind, 
Shed not one drop of blood, or ye shall not 
Be paid a single sou. Remember well, 
That he that's with him is a friend. Go. {Exit ruffians. 

Now, 
Villere, I think I'll make thee much repent 
This morning's insult, thrown with heedless hand 
Into my face. Villere my prisoner, 
My favor with the Spanish chief is doubly 
Sure ; and thus both interest and my hate 
I serve at once ; and yet I will myself 
Be safe, nor stand the danger of a blow. 
'Tis thus with prudence men should ever act, 
Nor rashly jeopardize their own lives 
In open combats of uncertain end. 
It is not all to serve the spite one feels, 
But most maturely should we weigh results. 
None would I hurt who useful to me are, 
Though I should hate them with a poisoned hate. 
But if I loved a man — though that can't be — 
I'd have him murdered if he barred my plans. 
These fights, done in the world's wide eye, create 
To one an host of angry enemies ; 
But 'tis the midnight blow, the killing draught, 
Which yield revenge while safety is not risked ; 
And on to-morrow I can give this hand 
Into the brother of the man it kills 
To-night. 

Gar. (outside). 'Tis a fit place. Good Sir Villere, 
Let us here dismount and seek the path : on foot 
We'll find it easier. Our steeds are tired — 
Let's give them rest a while. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 445, 

Aub. All, here they come, 

I must conceal myself ; I'll not approach 

Until he's well secured and bound. [Emit Aubry. 

[Enter Garidel and Villere.] 

Vil. Well, Garidel, 

"With thy fancy for a shorter path, 
We're lost, and now must pass the dreary night 
In this cold morass. 

Gar. I promise it, good sir, 

That in a healthy bed you'll sleep this night, 
And 'neath a shelter most secure. {Thunder.) 

Vil. Hear that ! 

And we shall have a storm to make the night 
Most comfortably romantic. [Lightning and thunder?) 

Gar. Indeed, 

Sir Villere, walk with me but some few steps : 
Surely I'll meet with friends. 

{Enter Ruffians slowly creeping behind.'] 

Vil. Pshaw ! seest thou not 

That we are in the very swamp itself ? 
This delay distracts me. Oh, my country ! 
May Heaven shield thee till I send thee help. 
I fear the battle, on which turns thy fate, 
Will be decided e'er I send thee succor ; 
And that thy little band will be o'erwhelmed. 

Gar. Come. This swampy air doth chill your blood : 

Yil. (turning, sees the Ruffians and draws). Ah, see. 
Garidel ! through the darkness I discover 
Some human figures lurking. 

Gar. Ah ! doubtless 

They are black, runaways ! Give me your sword, 
For I am young and strong ; take these instead. 
(They exchange arms. Villere gives Garidel his sword, who 
returns a brace of pistols. The Ruffians rush on Villere, who 
attempts to fire, but the pistols snap. The Ruffians seize him.) 

Vil. Treachery ! Wretches ! slaves ! unhand me ! 
(The curtain falls?) 

ACT III. 
Scene 1. — The interior of Lafreniere's tent. 
[Enter Lafreniere.] 
Laf. I like the plan ; it will, I think, secure 
A glorious victory. On one side 



446 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

The deep, broad, rapid Mississippi rolls ; 

And, on the other, impenetrable swamps 

Prevent approaches of the foe. Our front 

Protected by a breastwork and a fosse, 

We can defy the well-drilled troops of Spain, 

Bring all our force to bear, and though unused 

To battle (yet, in savage forests trained 

To use, with fatal aim, the carabine), 

Americana' s brave and hardy sons 

Will strew the field with dead, make the Spaniard 

Shrink away with dread, and victory insure. 

Tes, I like the plan ; it answers well ; 

It is the only one by which the rising 

City of my birth, Louisiana's pride, 

Can be defended 'gainst invading hordes 

Who seek for rapine and for slaughter. 

{Enter Aitbry.] 

Aubry ! What wouldst coward, traitor, here ? 
Hast thou repented — hast thou brave become, 
And wouldst thou aid thy country in the fight ? 
Or dost thou come, a cunning spy, to watch 
Our movements, and give the Spaniards notice ? 

Aub. Lafreniere, I am no traitor. I ne'er 
Acknowledged thy authority, nor that 
Of those who rashly made you chief : I owe 
Allegiance to the Spanish king ; and I 
Do show obedience to the plain command 
Of Louis, by whose decree and gracious will 
I held the rule o'er this fair colony. 
I have protested, but in vain 'twas done, 
'Gainst thine and the people's usurpation 
Of the power which belonged to me. But since 
My proclamation is disdained, 
I ask thee — chief of this rebel army — 

Laf. {offers to strike him). Kebel ! vile traitor, had I not pity 
On thy helplessness, I'd shake thy limbs apart 
For this insulting insolence. 

Aub. Nay, sir, 

Excuse my words ; no insult did I mean, 
And hope it is not taken so. The words 
Came of themselves upon my lip : I called 
Them not with wish of giving you offence ; 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1768. 447 

But rebels, fear I, ye will still be named, 
Unless victorious in the coming fight— 

(Lafreniere offers to draw.) 
Nay, sir — I beg — I would not anger you — 
There's no insult meant. 

Laf. Speak ! What wouldst thou ? 

Aub. I pray that, since I owe you no submission, 
Since enrolment with you is but voluntary, 
Since 'tis the duty of the rank I hold, 
Since my proclamation has been vain, 
That you would let me, at this hour, repair 
Unto the Spanish camp, and there remain, 
And all the rights of war partake as do 
The other subjects of the Iberian king. 

Laf. Pshaw ! Think' st thou that we do want thee 'mongst us ? 
Go, sir ! The service thou canst render Spain 
"Will do us little injury. Go, sir ! 
And bow thy servile head unto the slave 
Of Europe's vilest despot. Go, sir ! 
We want not cowards, traitors, 'mongst us ; 
We'll dread thee less when in the Spanish camp. 

Aub. I thank you, sir — I go ; but— 

Laf. Mind thee, sir, 

Thou'lt run much risk to cross this camp ; for if 
One of the citizens discover thee, 
Thou'lt soon be torn into a thousand parts. 

Aub. I know that ; for I heard them cursing me, 
As I passed through them to you. I dread not 
Such detection ; this cloak doth hide me well. 
But can I pass the outposts ? 

Laf. Thou couldst not, 

Unless thou hadst the word. But that would make 
Thee tremble, but to hear it spoken out ; 
'T would choke thy utterance to speak the word ; 
'Twas made for braves and freemen to pronounce. 
Without there ! citizen ! 

{Enter Soldier.] 
Conduct this 
Man beyond the outposts, and leave him free. 

[Exit Soldier and Aubry, who hows to Lafreniere as he goes out. 
O man ! thou art a creature strange indeed ! 
Who can explain the workings of thy heart ? 
Aubry is insolent, yet cowardly — 



448 POE TR Y—DRA MA TIC. 

A traitor, who killeth while caressing you ; 
And yet how many other men are mild, 
Yet brave and true, who scorn a crime ! 

'Tis strange — 
Some men have virtue, others vice ; and while 
Each beast has some peculiar character, 
Man cannot say that he is so or so. 
The tiger is bloody, false, and cowardly ; 
The lion is bold and generous ; but men 
Have souls of various makes, so many 
That they not even know themselves. 

But Yillere— 
I get no news of him ; what can it mean ? 
'Tis now a week since I have sent him hence, 
And yet he does not send intelligence ; 
!No succors do arrive. Why lags he thus \ 
Are the settlements indisposed to join % 
Is he neglectful ? No ! That cannot be. 
I know not what to think. 

'[Enter Mks. Yillere'.] 

Mes. Vil. Lafreniere ! 

Laf. Madam ! What can bring you here ? 
"What has occurred ? Your look is full of pain. 

Mrs. Yil. Where is my husband, Lafreniere ? 

Laf. Thy husband ! 

Lady, I sent him to the settlements 
To gather forces for the army. 

Mes. Yil. Have you got news ? Where — how fares my hus- 
band? 

Laf. Lady, I'll not deceive you — I know not. 
Daily I've waited for some messenger — 
Yet none from him has arrived. I tremble 
Lest some accident has befallen him. 

Mrs. Yil. Ah ! 'Tis this I have trembled should occur. 
Ah ! 'Twas thy unquiet spirit led him on, 
And brought thy country into dangers vain. 

Laf. Madam, reproach me not. Do you not teach 
Your beauteous daughter, by your precepts wise, 
That honor's palm is more, in real worth, 
Than the gaudiest diadem which e'er was placed 
Upon the brows of shameless votaries — 
That death is better than a tarnished fame ? 
And wouldst thou see thy loved husband, lady, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 449 

Or I, or any of thy countrymen, 

Bend to a stranger's pride \ Say, should we live 

To blush to own that we do live >. Ah, lady, no ! 

It cannot be that Villere s wife doth utter 

Words which would make her husband blush to hear. 

Mrs. Yil. True, true. Lafreniere, thou dost speak it right. 
Pardon me— I am distracted. Heaven 
Is witness that I love my husband's fame ; 
But I could love him with that fame all lost. 

Laf. Cheer up, good madam ! 

[Enter First Soldier.] 

What wouldst thou, soldier \ 
Sold. A deserter from the Spanish camp asks 
For admittance near you. He doth assert 
That he has business pressing and important 
To lay before our chief. 

^ AF - Bring him to me. 

[Enter a Spaniard, exit Soldier.] 
Approach, good fellow ! Art thou from the camp 
Of Spain ? l 

Span. I am ; I hope it will please you, sir, 
I'm charged to bear this letter to you. 

Laf. Ha ! Thou God ! It is Villeivs writing ! 

Mrs. Vil. Villarf I 

Eead ! Bead ! Bead ! What does he say ? 

Laf. {reading). « My dear friend . 

To him who bears this I have promised safety, 
And from you a rich reward. Garidel 
Has proved a traitor ! Plotted with Aubry ! 
And since six long days I've been confined' 
On board a Spanish ship. Console my wife 
And gentle Adelaide ! " 

(Mrs. Yillere faints and falls into the amis of the Spaniard, while 

Lafreniere exclaims.) 
Eternal God ! 
He has escaped me ! Aubry ! Aubry ! 
Hadst thou but come an hour later ! What can I do '. 
I have no prisoners who are worth him ; 
I'd have to force the Spanish camp to reach 
The ship. My troops are much too raw. Distraction ! 

Mrs. Yil. (recovering). Oh, my poor heart ! Thou art quite 
hard to burst. 
29 



450 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

{To the Spaniard.) Where is the ship % — the Spanish ship which 

holds 
My husband — the man who sent you here ? 

Span. A mile 

Below the other camp, and near the shore, 
It lies. {Exit Mrs. Villere. 

Laf. {who has not seen what has passed, but who is still mus- 
ing). Yes, that's the only way to save him — yes. 
To-night, assisted by th' obscurity, 
I go, in a well-armed boat, below, 
To burn the ship, and save my aged friend — 
Ah ! Where is the lady gone ?. 

Span. She went out 

In sorrow overwhelmed. 

Laf. Poor, good lady ! 

She hastes too much to tell the fatal news 
Unto her daughter and her friends. Follow ! {Exeunt. 

Scene 2. — A Spanish ship at anchor in the Mississippi, near the bank • 
two boats alongside y sailors lounging in different postures : the sun 
setting • Aubry and Garidel on deck. 

Aub. The fool ! He thinks that bravery alone 
Can the Spaniards in this crisis serve. Ha ! 
I know a secret path meandering 
Through the swamp, by which I can, with every ease, 
Bring in his rear half of the Spanish host, 
While in his front the other half doth charge. . 

Gar. Ha ! ha ! How will his helter-skelter band 
Oppose Spain's compact legions then ? But say, 
How has the poison worked \ Did you inquire ? 

Aub. Yes ; while roving about the city's streets, 
I met a slave of theirs. The thing works well, 
But slowly ; each day a change for worse is seen. 
It will soon break out in all its frightfulness. 

Gar. I saw her use it ere I started thence — 
Perhaps she does so even now. I felt 
A strange pleasure when I saw it. Aubry, 
Thou didst discover regions in my soul 
Which ere thou cam'st were yet untrodden. Thanks 
Be to thee for thy keen perception. I've found 
My element ; soon wilt thou see me swimming 
In a sea of blood. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 451 

Aub. {arising). Garidel, adieu, 
This hour must I meet O'Keilly — he'll not 
Be driven off as Don Ulloa was. 
To-night I lead the Spanish troops around ; 
And to-morrow shall Lafreniere's blood 
Stream out with bubbling force, and I shall laugh 
To see it flow. 

{He enters a boat.) 
Gar. Adieu, good master Aubry ; 
I wish thee much success. I'll be with you 
If my duty here is done in good time. 
I've yet to hang old father Villere ; 

I think he'll not take long to die. Adieu. {Exit Aubry. 

Well, now that darkness has commenced, I may 
Begin this old rascal's execution. 
My men ! To work ! Prepare the rope — bring up 
That fellow from the cabin. We shall see 
How he can dance in air ; from yonder mast 
We'll swing him off. Ha ! here he comes ! I'll try 
The temper of his soul, in this dread hour, 
E'en in its tenderest part. 

[Enter Villere, led up in chains.'] 

Sir Villere, 
Good news I bring you — your child and lady 
Soon you'll see. 

Vil. O Garidel ! Though thou hast 

Betrayed me, and most ungrateful proved ; 
Though thou hast e'en upbraided me for all 
The very kindness I've heaped upon thee — 
Yet I would pardon all, and die with joy, 
Could I but clasp them once — but once — again, 
With these weak, shackled arms ! 

Gar. Well, then, 'tis gained ; 

Soon will I have thy pardon, benefactor. 
Ye'll meet them not with shackled arms, and not 
To quit them soon again. Come, will you go ? 

Vil. Indeed ! 

Gar. I do assure you ! 

Vil. (kneeling). I thank thee 

With lowly and confounded wonder, God ! 
God of the helpless, receive my fervent 
Thanks. 



452 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Gar. Amen ! 
{All the Sailors together.) Amen ! 

Yil. {rising). Well, Garidel ! 

Do I go now, or when ? 

Gar. Yes, even now. 

Yil. Take off my chains. 

Gar. Not yet ; but ye shall not 

Have them when you meet your wife and child. 

Yil. Well, well, that's all I care for ; say, go I 
Within that boat % 

Gar. No ! By a shorter road. 

{Pointing to the rope prepared to hang Yillere.) 
See ! Yon rope shall bear thee to them. 
Thy wife and child will meet thee in the grave. 

(Garidel and the Sailors burst into a loud laugh.) 

Yil. {after standing a while confounded). Wretches ! 

[Enter Mrs. Yillere, on the bank.] 

Mrs. Yil. My husband ! 

Yil. God ! is this a dream '. 

Gar. No, it is no dream ! 'Tis triumph ! Glory ! 
Woman, prepare to see thy husband die ! 

Mrs. Yil. {kneeling). Oh, spare him, Garidel ! Oh, remember, 
He saved thee when a child from want and death, 
He was a father to thee in thy youth, 
He loves thee with paternal love ! Oh, stay ! 

Garidel, have pity ! 

Gar. Pity ? I know not 

What you mean. (Mrs. Yillere faints.) 

Yil. Nay, trifle not so roughly ; 

This can't be serious ; 'tis a cruel play. 

1 will go to my wife ; she awaits me there. 

Gar. Ha ! ha ! The gallows 'tis awaits you, sir ! 
Come, prepare the rope — despatch ! 

Yil. The gallows ! {Striking Garidel.) 

Slave ! Durst thou thus insult me ? 

Gar. {drawing a dagger). Ha, Yillere ! 

This dagger was given me for thee ! 

{Stabs Yillere several times.) 

Yil. {falling). God! 

I'm dying ! My child ! My wife ! My country ! {Dies.) 

Mrs. Yil. (recovering). Where is my husband ? Did he not 
call me ? 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 453 

Gar. (steeping a kerchief in Villere's blood). Thy husband,, 
woman ! Here is his blood ! 

(Throws the kerchief to her.) 
Mrs. Vil. (staggering). Oh ! 

Gar. Art thou not satisfied ? Go, join him, then ! 

(Fires a pistol at her / she falls and dies.) 
(At that moment Lafreniere rushes in along the shore, accompanied 

by armed 'followers.) 
Laf. Stop, murderers ! Ah, ye have done your work ! 
But mine begins ! Fire ! (The soldiers f re; Garidel staggers.) 

Gar. (falling). Lafreniere, I die ! 

But I await thee at the gates of hell. (Falls.) 

ACT IV. 

Scene 1. — Lafreniere's Camp. Lafreniere's tent in the background. 
The bodies of Mr. and Mrs. Villere laid out on a litter; 
Lafreniere gazing upon them. 

Laf. There — there is what is left of noble man 
And virtuous woman. There Villere lies, 
The wise, the brave, the generous — a man 
Respected, loved ; he had a crowd of friends, 
Who shook his hands and clasped him in their arms : 
Now they would loathe e'en to put their finger 
On his dead, but stately, brow ; they'd stand round 
In silence, as if they feared to wake him 
From the marble sleep of death, and look on 
With eyes and faces which would seem to say, 
Can he be dead ? What ! can this be the man — 
The living man we saw but yesterday ? 
To-day, God ! what could have done this ? 
By some slight gashes on his side he lieth there 
The senseless mockery of what he was ! 
And on his human faculties is placed 
A seal as lasting as eternity. 
[Enter Adelaide, extremely pale and emaciated ; he does not see her.~\ 
Thou God ! what will I say to Adelaide ? 
I'd tremble 'neath the look of that poor girl, 
And feel, though pure, as guilty of a crime. 

Ade. Lafreniere ! 

Laf. Heavens ! What voice is that ? 

No, no, it cannot be — thou art not Adelaide ! 



454 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Ade. O Laf reniere ! speak not such dreadful words. 
I know it — I am no more that beauteous 
Adelaide on whom ye once did fix the gaze 
Of love ; but though now but the ghost of what 
I was — the tattered remnant of a robe 
"Which once was rich and graceful — oh, let not 
This new deformity drive away the love 
"Which once was fostered in thy breast 
For me ! Oh, make me not loathe e'en myself ! 
Know'st thou not thine Adelaide ? Say, has she lost 
All semblance to herself % 

Laf. My Adelaide ! (They embrace.) 

Ade. Lafreniere ! Ah ! well mayst thou look with wide 
Astonished eyes upon me. Look, look on ; 
But try to look with love and not disgust. 
Seest thou these sunken, tarnished eyes — this 
Deadened skin which leaves the unhealthy flesh — 
These lips, which thou didst oft compare, whene'er 
Amidst the bloom of spring we roved, to every 
Crimson flower thou didst pluck — these lips, 
Like those now withered flowers, have faded too. 

Laf. Kay ; rave not so, my own dear Adelaide, 
'Tis only passing sickness — thou'lt be well 
In some few days. 

Ade. No, no ; believe it not. 

I thought so too ; but I did hear them say, 
In whispers which they thought I did not hear, 
'Twas poison — 

Laf. Poison ? 

Ade. Yes, a cankering 

Drug, well known by its fell workings on me, 
Which on my skin perfidious hands have put, 
And which will soon (oh, wilt thou love me then ?) 
Break out in putrid sores and leaking biles. 
Kay, do not seem thus horror-struck. 

Laf. O God ! 

It cannot be, my Adelaide. Who could have done 
So infamous a deed % What hast thou done — 
Who harmed — that one should seek thee out and thus 
Deface thy cheek with his polluted hands ? 

Ade. Ah, was it not a wanton crime ? 

Laf. O man ! what can exceed thy wickedness ? 
That enemy of every breathing thing, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 455 

The serpent of the woods, will raise his head, 

Hiss, and shake his rattles at the approach 

Of unsuspecting feet. But man, the greatest 

Enemy of man, rejoiceth in the blood 

Of innocence ; and, while wild beasts destroy 

To get their food, man — savage man — doth kill 

To kill, and doth amusement find to see 

The blood ooze out of wounds his hand has made. 

And laughs when victims writhe in death's last agony. 

Ade. Ah, Lafreniere, say dost thou love me still ? 

Laf. If I do love thee, Adelaide ? Ask me 
If this warm heart still beats ; for till its throbs 
Do cease, its highest bound will be for thee. 

Ade. We parted last in anger. 'Twas silly ; 
But thou wilt not chide me, Lafreniere, 
Though 'twas a jealous whim, for sorrow now 
Inflicts the punishment upon me. Think, 
I blush to tell thee, some rival enemy 
Of thine — he cannot be thy rival now, 
For thy love hangs not on the flesh as doth 
The love of common men — yes, that rival 
Wrote me this, and I believed it — ah, wilt 
Thou love me less ? 

Laf. Astonishment ! Yes, yes, 

'Tis Aubry's secret hand with which he wrote 
That false perfidious note he once addressed 
To Don Ulloa, full of monstrous lies 
Against his countrymen. Aubry ! Aubry ! 
Thy deeds will soon encounter punishment. 
Thou God, turn on him his own faithless arms ; 
Bring on him, though not from Lafreniere's hands, 
The lying snares he knows so well to lay — 
The poisoned blades he can so well direct. 

Ade. {seeing the bodies, but not recognizing). Ah, what ! has 
the war so soon been fatal % 
Perhaps some orphan o'er each body there will weep 
A father slain. Who are they, Lafreniere ? 

Laf. (aside). Thou God, what can I do to ward this blow 
away ? 

Ade. Say, were they good and virtuous % 

Laf. They were indeed. 

Ade. O death ! why dost thou not — whose arm 
Guides in its rapid flight the fatal ball, 



456 POETR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

Directs the impending sabre where to strike — 

Why dost thou not, while ruling o'er the field, 

Select such victims of the battle's strife 

As should be punished by thy bloody scythe ? 

Preserve the father for his anxious child, 

And pierce the heart whose wishes, could they kill, 

Would slay a husband and a widow make. 

Say, had they children ? I would fain console them 

In their pains, for I can feel how strong must be 

The pangs which tear a son's or daughter's soul 

When parted from a father's love forever. 

Laf. My Adelaide, look not so on that dark 
Display of man's frail destiny, but come, 
For much emotion suits not thy weak health. 
Within my tent thou mayest rest awhile. 
The travel from the town must have fatigued 
Thee much. 

Ade. True. But is my mother there ? 

Laf. Thy mother ? 

Ade. Yes. What startles you so much ? 

Where is my mother ? I must find her straight. 
She went from home to seek thee, and inquire 
If news you had of my father's uncertain fate. 
She promised, when she left my filial arms, 
In three short hours to be back again. 
But what disturbs thy countenance, and shakes 
Thy body thus ? Some accident, I fear, 
Hath to my mother here occurred. 

Laf. No, no. 

'Tis the humid breath of evening which makes 
Me feel unwell. Come, come, let's hasten in. 

Ade. Nay, nay ! I came to seek my mother here. 
Where is my mother ? 

Laf. My gentle Adelaide, 

Why wilt thou fret so much ? What wouldst thou, girl, 
Should happen to thy mother here ? 

Ade. Cruel ! 

Part not a mother from her child. Oh, sir, 
What harm has crossed her path % Shall I not look 
Again upon her features — kiss her cheek ? 
Oh, I pray you by the love to me you've sworn, 
Give — give me back my mother ! 

Laf. Adelaide, 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 457 

Have courage, girl. How can I tell thee aU 
Unless thou hast a stouter heart ? 

Ade - Oh, yes ! 

I see it now ! Some fatal accident 
Has robbed me of her ! Oh, my mother ! 
Where— O Lafreniere, where is my mother ? 
Let me embrace her even if she's dead. (She turns to the bodies.) 
Ha ! ' 

Can it be !— those bodies ! (She runs towards then.) 
Laf - Adelaide ! 

Ade. (uncovering one of the bodies). Oh! (Faints.) 
Laf. (taking her in his arm,). Too tender maid, canst thou 
withstand this shock ? 
Or has it, like the fiery bolt from high, 
Destroyed the beating life within thy breast, 
And borne thy soul upon its wings to God ? ' ' 
Halloo, within there ! 

[Miter First Soldier.] 
Go, call the surgeon 
Of the army— fly ! Tell him it presses much ! 

[Exit First Soldier.. 
[Exit Lafreniere, hearing Adelaide into his tent. 
[Enter Denoyant.] 
Den. Yes, yes, it must be so ; the troops I see 
Advancing in our rear are certainly 
The promised succors from the country sent ; 
They have a martial mien, appear well ranged, 
And firm within their ranks. (A trumpet sounds distantly) Do 

J. near, 
Or are my ears deceived \ A Spanish march 
Methinks they sound. I do remember well 
The tune. (The trumpet sounds again.) 
[Enter Marquis.] 
Marq. We are lost ! we are lost ! undone ! 
Den. Friend, what hast thou >. 

Marq. Tne Spaniards, on our rear, 

Approach with half their force. See them advance » 
Come, let us haste and arm. [Exeunt. 

[Enter Lafreniere.] 
Laf - Thank God, she breathes ! 

But, oh ! she will not long survive the hour 
Which loosed the band which held on earth the soul 
Of parents, whom as much the girl did love 



45 8 POE TR Y—DRA 31 A TIC. 

As the woodland flower doth the earth and shade 
By which 'tis nourished and 'neath which it grows. 
Once taken from that native soil, it pines, 
Nor can attentive hands revive its drooping life — 
No man-made showers, nor artificial warmth, 
Can stop its fading or arrest its death. 
[Miter Denoyant.] 

Den. See, Laf reniere, see ! the Spaniards come ! 

Laf. Nay, Denoyant ! seest thou not they come 
Upon the rear ? How could the Spaniards pass 
The morass on our left, the river on our right \ 
These are doubtless succors, come at last. 

Den. Nay, sir. Observe their discipline, their dress, 

{The distant trumpet sounds again.) 
And listen to that march. 

Laf. My doubts are gone. 

Den. And Louisiana's lost. 

Laf. Not so, sir ! 

She is not lost ! Are our hands chopped off ? 
Are we not Louisianians yet ? 
The coming fight will show you, sir, what can 
Men, by the love of Liberty impelled, 
'Gainst venal hirelings to tyrants sold. 

Den. On our front too — see, sir— the enemy 
Is marshalling his men. 

Laf. To arms ! to arms ! 

Haste thee, Denoyant, and bear the order. 
Let the drum beat the call to arms. Send here 
The chief commander of each regiment. 

[Krit Denoyant. 
{Kneeling.) Eternal God ! thou knowest all the deep 
Sincerity of this uncorrupted heart ; 
And though 'mongst men my bearing has been proud, 
Before thy throne I've always humbly bowed. 
God ! thou who pourest out, with equal hand, 
Into the current of unstaying time, 
Joy's limpid stream and sorrow's cup of brine, 
Send not to me an unalloyed draught of gall, 
But let some sweet be mingled with the pain 
"Which of late days has fallen to my share. 
But if against me only thou art angered, 
Then let thy wrath descend on me alone ; 
And save my country from the ills which I 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 459 

Should suffer by thy wisdom's stern decree. 
God ! By thy strong will our struggles aid, 
And send confusion through the ranks of those 
Who make Thy name a frightening password 
To the greatest crimes. God, I pray thee for 
My country's liberty. Liberty, the gift 
"Which thou didst give to man e'en from his birth, 
Shall it be wrested from his hand to-day \ 
Thou didst not destine him for slavery 
When thou didst make him like unto thyself, 
And stamped him in the holy, perfect mould 
Of thine own intelligence and beauty. 
Shall this proud soul which liveth here, and which, 
By thine own lungs, was breathed into this breast, 
Be cramped within the carcass of a slave ? 
It cannot be ! I feel thine impulse now ; 
And victory for us will soon make this day 
A day of record on our grateful hearts. {Rises.) 
[Enter several officer*, among whom are Marquis, Milhet, and 

Careeke.] 
(The drums heat the cull, and the cry is heard.) 
To arms ! to arms ! to arms ! to arms ! to arms ! 
[Enter Denoyant.] 

Den. A herald from the Spanish line awaits. 

Laf. Bring him to me. 

[Eater a Spanish Herald.] 

Well, Spaniard, what wouldst thou? 

Her. Dost thou command these hostile bands \ 

Laf. I do. 

Her. I come a messenger of peace. If you 
And yours surrender ere the tight, ye shall 
Be treated with humanity, and all 
Your vain rebellion pardoned. 

Laf. What ! pardoned ! 

Sirrah ! Go, tell your master 'tis in vain 
He thinks to cheat us with his futile tricks. 
We know how far a Spaniard we can trust. 
His rancor can be only cooled with blood ; 
His falsehood teaches him to kill the man 
He hates, e'en while he greets him with a kiss. 
Go, tell your chief that pardon we ne'er ask, 
But from our God for sins against his law. 
Pardon, indeed ! We disdain his offer ; 



460 POETR Y—DRA MA TIC. 

And rather much would give him our blood 
Thau take his favors, though he tenders life. 

Her. Then must I tell you that without delay 
The battle will begin on our part. 

Laf. We are prepared. 

[Exit Herald- 
(To the officers.) Is all ready, gentlemen, 
To face the enemy ? Can I depend 
Upon the bravery and the firmness 
Of the men of all your companies ? 

Officers. You can ! you can ! 

Laf. Well, then, the word shall be, 

Charge on for liberty ! When ye return, 
And take the head, each of his separate band, 
Ye'll tell the soldiers that it is my plan 
To break the foe who pens us in the rear, 
And then to intrench again beyond them. 
Tell them that if we fail in this design, 
Our country's lost, and, what is ten times worse, 
We lose our freedom, ne'er to get it back. 
Try ye to inspire each soldier with a firm 
Resolve to die or to be free. Remember, 
That on our arms to-day depends the fame, 
The future reputation of our country ; 
And on this day we heroes make ourselves, 
Or gain the base and ignominious name 
Of slaves. Sirs, remember that ! and when ye charge 
Upon those Spanish dogs, shout the loud cry 
Of Liberty into their ears. 'Twill make 
The rascals shrink and fly ; and like the damned, 
Whose power fails when saints appeal to Christ, 
These slaves will prostrate fall, when high are raised 
The voice and arm of patriots unstained, 

For martyrdom prepared. {Exeunt. 

[Enter Adelaide and Surgeon from the tent.'] 

Surg. Lady! lady! 

You need for rest. Why will you leave your bed, 
To strain yourself by this exertion great ? 
This hard struggle 'gainst your weakness now 
Will hurt you much, and may be fatal to you. 

Ade. I pray to God, good surgeon, that it will. 
Death cannot come too soon upon me now, 
For now he parts me from my parents dear. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 401 

The blow which struck them reached the feeble thread 
On which my life doth hang ; and now I'll knock 
With arm untiring at the door of Death, 
Until he gives me entrance through that gate 
At whose dread portal has been left the dust 
Of those who were my dearest love on earth. 

(She goes to the bodies/ drums beat the charge, firing and shouts are 

heard.) 

Surg. Lady ! lady ! for heaven's sake, retire. 
The battle's raging, and some straying ball 
May strike you dead. Come ; I will bring you 
To some safer place, where, from these flying deaths, 
You'll sheltered be. (Firing, drums, and shouts.) 

Ade. Not so. Here let me weep, 

And call on Death. He'll hear the better here, 
For he is near me in an hundred shapes. 
O father ! mother ! why are the deadly strokes, • 
Which fell on ye so lavishly, withheld 
From me, whose heart would leap to meet them now ? 

(Firing, drum*, and shouts.) 

{Enter Lafreniere.] 

Laf. {throwing away his sword). Go from my hand, thou 
useless trash ! Lost ! lost ! 
Thrice did our soldiers charge, and thrice repulsed ; 
They strive in vain to form their broken ranks ; 
By myriads stopped, though myriads they have slain, 
'Twere vain to try to bring- them on again. 
In small detachments scattered o'er the field, 
They fight surrounded by the compact lines 
Of mercenary troops — full ten times more 
In numbers. God ! God ! Can I not something do 
To turn the current of the day ? Ah, yes ! 
There — there — I see a rallied regiment ! (Shouts.) 
Nay ! nay ! nay ! poor weakened eyes, they're Spanish troops. 

(Shouts.) 
Yes, ye demons, stretch forth your glutted throats, 
Which gurgle with the blood to-day ye've drank. 
Let it be heard 'midst hell's eternal fires, 
And let the damned reecho up the cry, 
Turned'to a shout of victory 'gainst God ! 

(Spanish soldiers rush in.) 



4G2 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

First Spanish Soldier, Kill him ! it is their chief. 
Ade. {rushing forward and shielding Lafreniere). Nay, nay ! 
not so ! 
Ye cowards ! ye shall kill a woman first ! 

{The curtain drops.) 



DREAM OF LAFRENIERE. 

(between the fourth and fifth acts.) 
Lafreniere appears sleeping in a prison. 

The prison vanishes, and a landscape appears ; a wide river flows 
through the centre; and on each side of it, extensive forests and 
uncultivated fields are seen. On one side stands a throne, on which 
a personification of Europe is seated, holding a sceptre, and having a 
lash and fetters lying at her feet. A personification of Louisiana sits 
weeping, chained to the throne; plaintive music, and pantomime 
expressive of the distress of Louisiana, and of the despotism and 
cruelty of Europe. 

The music gradually changes to more stern and threatening tones ; 
the sky darkens ; clouds appear ; the thunder is heard, and the light- 
ning flashes. 

A thunderbolt strikes the throne, which crumbles to pieces, while 
Europe is thrown prostrate on the earth. 

The gloom is dispelled, the clouds disappear, the music is joyful^ 
and Louisiana exults. 

Liberty appears descending from above, bearing the American flag. 
Above the head of Liberty seventeen stars [representing the number 
of States of the Union at the time Louisiana was admitted] appear 
arranged in a circle around the words " Constitution," " Union." 

Liberty approaches and takes off the fetters of Louisiana, saying : 
" Arise, my child, rejoin thy sisters. Thou art freer They embrace 
each other, while Liberty points to the Star of Louisiana rising in the 
sky, and ranging itself with the others. 

" Hail, Columbia" breaks forth, and to that tune the fields flourish, 
cities rise, boats and ships ply upon the river, and busy crowds of 
people thicken on the landscape. 

The prison resumes awhile its appearance, and again disappears- 
to give place to a dark curtain, on which suddenly appears a circle of 
portraits (drawn in white) representing the Eevolutionary heroes and 
worthies, with Washington in the centre. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 463 

ACT V. 

Scene 1. — A Prison. Lafreniere fettered, and chained to a ring in 

the wall. 

Laf. O Liberty, thou art not invincible ! 
Slaves by plunder baited have o'erthrown thee, 
And thus it seems, that hearts inclined to crime 
Do feel for crime as great enthusiasm, 
As souls which take their fire from the skies 
Do in the acting of a virtuous deed. 

my country ! and art thou then like me 
Chained, fettered, and beneath a tyrant's foot ? 
Ah ! was green America sought in vain 

By Pilgrim Fathers, flying 'cross the main 

To seek a refuge from oppression's rod ? 

Were its wide forests, where untutored men 

Live 'neath the shade of the tall magnolia — 

Were its broad rivers, 'gainst whose current nought 

But the Indian's light canoe can ply — 

Was its free soil, from whence civilization's foot 

Not yet treads down and wears the verdure off — 

Were these unto degrading slavery doomed ? 

Oh, no ; it cannot be ! And still I hope. 

Last night, when dragged across the horrid field,. 

Where hundreds of my countrymen laid dead, 

Pierced by mercenary swords and balls, 

1 was thrown here, within this dungeon dark — 
Long did I weep Louisiana's fall, 

Till sorrow's fount was drained all dry : 

Sleep came at last, and closed my heavy eyes 

To ope imagination's lids on worlds 

Unknown, and in prophetic dreams to wake 

Midst future days. I saw, though Death methought 

Did press me down with his unbending arm, 

My country in a veil of darkness wrapped, 

Her wrists and ankles worn by clinching chains, 

Her back all marked with deep and bleeding stripes, 

And moaning 'midst her sufferings. But soon 

The darkness vanished, and a brilliant light 

Dispersed the clouds which hung around in gloom ; 

And forth appeared, in shining radiance, 

A youth whose air spoke Freedom, and whose frame 



464 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Was built with strength and grace ; in his right hand 

A palm and sword he held, and in his left 

A scroll on which eternal truths were written, 

And a floating banner, where, in beauty 

Blended, were the white, and blue, and red, 

In fulgent stars and flowing stripes disposed. 

He broke her bonds, and with his manly voice 

Exclaimed, " Go, join thy sisters ; thou art free." 

[Enter Adelaide.] 
Adelaide ! What miracle has oped the door 
Of this gloomy dungeon to let thee in % 

Ade. Lafreniere, I bring thee news of freedom ! 
With gold — what Spaniard can resist its lure \ — 
I've gained thy jailer, and to-night thou flyest. 

Laf. Fly ! Lady, no ! Here will I stay, and meet 
My fate, whate'er it be. 

Ade. And that is death, 

If thou dost here remain. 

Laf. A brave man's death 

Is better than a coward's flight. 

Ade. 'Tis true. 

Couldst thou defend thyself, I'd rather see 
Thee fighting sword in hand, than aid thy flight ; 
But here assassination doth await thee, 
And, while thou sleepest, treachery will plunge 
His poisoned knife into thy noble heart. 

Laf. I care not how these Spaniards end my life ; 
My destiny is fixed. In freedom's cause 
To die, is greater, in my estimation, 
Than dragging out in vile obscurity 
An useless life. To-day it is the richest prize 
My country's conquerors have gained. 
Well, let them have it, while 'tis worth a crime. 
Thy father, girl, is laid among the martyrs 
Who yesterday did shed their blood and die 
For liberty. What ! Shall / shrink away 
And dread the example he has set me % 

Ade. Then there was hope, but now — 

Laf. Honor and glory 

Yet remain to be completely gained. 

Ade. Nay, 

Lafreniere, if thou lovest me, leave these vain 
Aspirings. Listen. There is an aged 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 4G5 

African, who seeing, as I passed by, 

The. threatened dissolution of my features, 

Offered to give me certain antidotes 

For the evil which afflicts me now. 

Lafreniere, thou art now the only prop 

Round which my life's weak vine will twine itself : 

My father — mother — both have been snapped off, 

And if thou fallest, Adelaide falls too. 

Laf. God, give me strength to meet this trial hard ! 

Ade. I will fly with thee to some distant land ; 
And there, in wedded love, we'll live in peace, 
Blest by contentment and a quiet home. 

Laf. "lis wrong to put into my hands thy fate ; 
Why with dilemma thus surround me i 
On one side, honor, the fame I cherish, 
Call me to stay and die ; on the other, 
My love, thy happiness and threatened life, 
Unite to make me swerve from duty's path. 
Adelaide, thou art unjust ; assist me 
Rather to preserve my fame unspotted, 
And tempt me not to play a shameful part. 

Ade. 'Tis said the northern colonies have raised, 
And threaten rebellion against England. 
Go, join them, and for freedom fight with them. 

Laf. I've sworn to free my country or to die ! 

Ade. Dost thou refuse % 

Laf. I do. 

{She sinks down upon a seat.) 
Nay, Adelaide, 
Sustain thyself with better courage. 

{Enter Aubkv.] 

Aubry here ! 
Aub. Ha ! ha ! Well, my good sir, what say you now \ 
Ha ! You have struck — heaped insults on me — 
Called me a coward. Well, you spoke the truth. 
Say, what think ye of a coward's vengeance % 

(Lafreniere rushes at Mm, hut is stopped hi/ the chcvm.) 
JSTo, no ! I had these chains too well prepared. 
Ade. Monster ! 

Aub. Ha ! Foolish wench ! What dost thou here ? 

Well, 'tis a double blow Fll strike. Listen. 
Ye know not all I've done against you both. 
30 



466 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

'Twas I seduced that rascal Garidel 

To place bis master in the Spaniard's hand, 

To pour a poison over this maiden's beauty, 
(Lafreniere strains to break his chains, and sinks down in the effort. 

trembling with rage.) 

Keep cool, good sir, that is not half. 'Twas I 

Who made him plunge a dagger in the heart 

Of Villere. 

Ade. God ! God ! (Faints.) 

Aub. What ! Faint already % 

Halloo without there ! 

[Enter Jailer.] 

Here, jailer, take out 
This foolish girl, and throw her in the ditch. 

[Exit Jailer bearing out Adelaide. 

So, sir, you have freed your country, have you ? 

A great and mighty general indeed ! 

Poor — foolish — vain — rash — green — hot-headed — boy! 

What ! Did you think to thwart a man like me '( 

Thy wild ambition showed the crazy youth, 

And not a man to lead an army on. 

Why were not the outskirts of your army 

Better guarded ? I led the Spaniards round 

And came upon your rear, nor even met 

A single scout until our drums ye heard. 

Ay, sir ! To me you owe your fall. Say, 

What think you of the puny coward now ? 

Laf. (rising). Aubry, I do despise thee still, and still 
I do defy thee ! Do thy worst ! All's not done — 
I still exist. Why am I not murdered ? 
Ye cannot lack for those who'd do the deed ; 
The country's full of Spaniards now. 

Aub. Be sure 

I will not leave my work unfinished thus, 
Nor can you teach me how to do it, boy. 
Ye shall not be murdered in the dark. No ! 
I'll have you ended on the public square. 
I'll have you tried, condemned in form, and shot ! 
You shall have company ; four of your friends, 
Denoyant, Carrere, Milhet, and Marquis, 
Have been already sentenced. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 467 

Laf. Wretch ! 

Aub. They come. 

Your judges here advance ; and, what is more, 
I am their colleague named. 

Laf. Thou ! 

Aub. Yes, sir, I ! 

[Enter two Judges and a Scribe. They seat themselves at a table 

together' with Aubry.] 

First Judge. Is this the man ? 

Aub. It is. 

First Judge. Of heinous crimes, 

Against your rightful king, you are accused. 
You have upraised sedition in this province ; 
You have been the chief of discontented bands ; 
You have led them on against the army 
Sent by his Majesty Most Catholic, 
Our gracious lord and master, Charles the Third, 
By grace of God King of Spain and India, 
To take possession of his proper claim, 
And legal acquisition — in one word, 
High treason is your crime. 

Laf. Most wise judges, 

Do I well hear your words ? Is it to judge 
Ye come, or, most sage and sapient judges, 
Am I condemned already \ Mark your words : 
" You have upraised sedition in this land, 
You have been the chief of discontented bands, 
You have "— " You have," good sirs, be not so swift ; 
Convict me first, and then my sentence read. 

Aub. Colleague, proceed in better form. Ask first 
His name. 

Laf. You're right, let it be done in form, 
Let me be murdered legally. 

First Judge. Mind, sir, 

With more respect your judges treat. Speak, 
But no insulting language use. Say, 
What is your name ? 

Laf. * Great Judge ! That very name 

Is the greatest insult I can speak 
When I address ye ; and by to-morrow 
'Twill be a greater insult still. It is — 
For I am proud to speak it — Lafreniere ! 



468 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

First Judge. (To Secretary.) Write. (To Lafreniere.) 
Your birthplace ? 

Laf. Most pleased am I to answer. 

I am a Creole, born in New Orleans. 

First Judge. Your profession \ 

Laf. An advocate. 

First Judge. Your age ? 

Laf. Out, dastards ! I'll parley no more with ye. 
Ye know me — who I am, and what I am ; 
And I plead guilty in every point 
On which ye do accuse me — ay, guilty ! 
And glory in what ye call a crime. Go ! 
I hate your nation and your tyrant King, 
I weep that I cannot destroy ye all, 
I moan my country's enslaved destiny, 
I pant to die ere ye have washed your hands 
Of all the blood ye shed on yesterday. 
Go ! I have enough of mockery. 

Aub. Ye hear, 

He doth confess. 

First Judge (to Scribe). Proceed ! Head the sentence. 

Laf. What ! Was it ready written up % Why, ye ape 
But ill your parts. 

Scribe {reading). " Lafreniere, found guilty, 
In due form, of high treason 'gainst the King, 
Is by this honorable court condemned, 
Within an hour hence, to die." 

Laf. Thank ye, kind gentlemen, ye could not more 
Give pleasure to me ; know, I kiss your hands, 
Ye grant me e'en my heart's core wish. 

[Exit Aubry, Scribe, and Judges. 
Oh, yes ; 
To-day my name is written in the sacred book — 
The purest, chosen page of history. 
From now my cherished name will live 
Immortal in the hearts of freemen — 
The Louisianian's future pride. 
He'll shout my name unto the skies ; 
He'll place it first upon the monument 
His heart will raise to virtue, surrounded 
By a glorious halo ! Eternal God ! 
I come — I come — already crowned before thee, 
The unstained martyr of bright Liberty ! 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 469 

Liberty ! the first and greatest dogma 
Thou dost teach us in thy book of nature. 
[Enter First Spanish Soldier, accompanied by other soldiers, with 
reversed m uskets ; and the Jailer. The drum heats a dead march.] 
First Spanish Soldier. Art thou prepared to go? Hast 

made thy prayer ? 
Laf. What I have asked of God, ye grant me now. 

(Jailer takes off the chains.) [Exeunt. 

Scene 2.— The Public Square. 
[Enter a Ruffian.] 
Ruf. The citizens have fled as if a pestilence 

Infected all this section of the city ; 

The place is desolate e'en as 'twere night. 

'Tis here they'll shoot the Creole chief to-day. 

A fine time this to rob some straying fool : 

If some rich scoundrel now would only pass 

Across this green, how quick I'd murder him, 

And rob him of his gold ! Ah, some one comes ! 

By the Holy Virgin, it is Aubry, 

For whom we seized the old man in the forest ! 

He's loaded, doubtless, with the riches gained 

By turning traitor to his countrymen. 

I'm tempted strong to let him pass along, 

For he is one of us who kill and steal 

And take false oath. Ha ! he lets fall a purse. 

Pshaw ! he picks it up. Saints ! 'tis full of gold ! 

By the holy cross, I'll have it ! (Hetires.) 
[Enter Atjbet.] 
Aitb. 'Tis well! 

My work is done. I am revenged, and now, 
With all the riches I have gained, I'll go 
To Europe and enjoy myself. But 
I must behold Lafreniere e'er I go. 
To-day he takes his crown of glory, and 
'Tis my purpose here to calculate, with care, 

The different value of his gain from mine. (Holding up the purse. \ 
Money ! who'd not worship thee is but a fool. 
What is fame, honors, titles, place, to thee ? 
Though I'm a coward and a criminal, 
More men- will bow to me, and envy me, 
And yield to my desires, than will e'er recall 



470 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

The memory of this great Lafreniere. 

Learn to make money, and then ye may 

Dispense with further knowledge. Gain riches ; 

It decks the bearer more than wisdom would, 

It is the power of a mighty prince, 

It is a brilliant title to one's name. 

See ! It has no smell nor pleasing taste, 

"Tis rigid to the touch, and yonder flower 

Which blooms unnoticed in the grass 

Exceeds it far in beauty ; yet I 

Have been as false and cruel as the tiger 

To obtain it, and still I think the prize 

Was quickly, cheaply gained. 

Why come they not ? 
I'll go and see whence this delay. 

\Eadt ArBRY, followed cautiously 1>ij the Ruffian. 

Aubry (without). Murder ! Oh ! 

(The drum is heard heating a dead march, grad/uaUy approaching ; tin 
orchestra plays soft and mov/rnfvl m/iisic.) 

[Eider Lafreniere escorted as hefore, and accompanied hy Denoy- 
ant, Milhet, Marquis, and Carrere; the soldiers range themselves on 

the right side.'] 

Laf. 'Tis triumph ! more glorious than the pomp 
Which glittered round a Roman conqueror. 
I envy not the wreath that Caesar wore 
When, from Pharsalia's field, he trod on Rome. 
His coronet was steeped in freemen's blood, 
Mine shall be wet with their regretful tears ; 
He sought to fetter Rome in slavery, 
I tried to make my native country free ; 
He died with usurpation's hand outstretched, 
I fall the martyr of bright liberty. 
And could / envy Caesar now ( Oh, no ! 
Like him I failed to gain a prize most dear, 
Yet do I die more proudly than he died ; 
For this I leave behind — a virtuous name. 
(To his companions.) My friends, I greet you joyfully 
As parties to a festive revelry, 
As bridegrooms on their wedding day, 
As saints who take their crown of sanctity ! 
This day the blood we'll here together spill 



THE MARTYR PATRIOTS; OR, LOUISIANA IN 1769. 471 

"Will rise into a monument of fame, 
"Will nourish seeds of freedom in this soil, 
And bless our country with five patriot names. 
Denovant, say ! since Freedom's cause is lost, 
Couldst thou wish aught more glorious than this, 
The death of freemen for their country slain ? 

Den. Ay, and who still defy the tyrant's power ; 
For though he slay us, and revengefully 
Should drag our bodies in ignoble dust, 
Yet, here or hence, our souls are ever free, 
And spurn the mandates of his tyranny. 

Marq. Unto us now the value of this life 
Is wholly lost ; a foreign master treads 
Upon our native land. 

Mil. How could we live 

Beneath the rule of such inhuman slaves ? 
Their hands are red with Villere's honored blood. 

Car. To me now death has all of freedom's charms ; 
For death will burst oppressive chains. 

Laf. 'Tis well ! 

Dear friends, now let us yield our ready breasts 
Unto the bullets of these murderers, 
Who bring disgrace upon the soldier's garb. 

(To the First Spanish Soldier.) Come ! why lag you thus your 
duty to perform ? 

(The Soldier offers to bandage his eyes.) 
Not so ! Think ye we cannot look on death '. 
Thou hast already seen us look it in the face. 
"Where shall we stand ? 

First Spanish Soldier. Yonder, between the trees. 

Laf. And now, my native land, but one more glance, 
And then I'll close my eyes in death with joy. 
Adieu, blue sky and verdant foliage, 
'Neath which, when but a child, I loved to play 
"With bounding limbs and fluttering heart, 
Adieu ! I look no more with pleasure on ye — 
Ye are no more what I did love ye for. 

( While Lafreniere is speaking, his companions retire behind the scenes 
on the left. Exit Lafreniere, same side.) 

Laf. (without). Now — now ! with hand in hand we'll fall at 



once 



For right and liberty 



472 POETR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

First Spanish Soldier. Are you prepared ? 

Laf. (outside). We are ! 

First Spanish Soldier. Soldiers, attention ! Ready ! Aim ! 

Laf. (outside). Liberty forever ! 

First Spanish Soldier. Fire ! 

(As the soldiers fire, Adelaide rushes in between them and Lafre- 
niere, and full* mounded. Lafreniere staggers in, mortally wounded 
in several parts erf the body, and falters towards her.) 

Laf. God ! she is killed. 

Adelaide ! Adelaide ! 

Ade. I thank that ball — 

By my torn side — it lets in death — ah — love — 
Dost thou still live ? — Lafreniere, I've news — news ! 

(Lafreniere smks down.) 
Nay, live awhile to hear me — e'er you die — 
Aubry, Aubry — is dead — murdered — murdered 
By a Spaniard for his gold — the gold he got 
From Spaniards to betray us — Adieu ! (She dies.) 

Laf. Great God ! (Risi s») 

First Spanish Soldier. Load, load your guns again, and finish 
him ! 

Laf. 'Tis useless — I feel the cold hand of death 
Press from my heart its last — last drop of blood. 
Louisianians, by my example learn 
How great — how noble — is a freeman's death ! (Falls and dies.) 



PAKEHASIUS; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION.* 
A Dramatic Poem. 

BY ESPY W. H. WILLIAMS. 

[Espy William Hendricks Williams was born, January 30, 1852, in Carrollton 
(now Seventh District of New Orleans), La. He was educated at his home until he 
attained his thirteenth year, when he was placed in a public school. He was conversant 
with the works of the best English dramatists before he was seventeen. Since 1869 he 
has been actively engaged in the insurance business in his native city. He has contrib- 
uted verses to the leading magazines of the country. In 1873 he wrote Prince Carlos, 
a blank verse tragedy, which was subsequently performed by the "New Histrionics," a 
dramatic club of New Orleans. In his book, A Dream of Art, and Other Poems (1892), 
is included his dramatic poem entitled The Atheist. Among his unpublished dramas 
are, Prince Carlos, Eugene Aram, The Last Witch, and Dante.'] 

Copyright : all rights reserved. [See note below.] 

Dedication — to Nannie. 

Dear heart, whose life must ever be 

The music of my life, 
Whose soul awakes the harmony 

Still wins my soul from strife — 
To thee, for whom my all is wrought, 
I give my latest gift of thought. 
June 9, 1879. 



THE STUDIO OF PARRHASIUS. 

(Parrhasius at work upon his painting of "Prometheus Bound." 

T H eon seated near.) 

Theon. 

Ambition ? Fame ? Beware, beware, Parrhasius ! 
Who tempts the envy of the gods courts ruin. 
Such fame as men award their honored kind, 
The fame of good deeds, charity, and love, 

* [On this dramatic poem the author founded his tragedy of Parrhasius, the stage 
right of which is the property of the well-known actor, Mr. Robert Mantell, who has made 
it a prominent addition to his repertory. The poem is included in this volume with the 
consent of both the author and Mr. Mantell.] 



474 POETR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

Brightens Olympus with a smile, and, yes ! 

Makes us in nature gods, though not in name. 

But such as thou wouldst strive for, such as lives 

Alone the symbol of imperious self, 

That shun ! It is the gods' prerogative. 

They have themselves forewarned us from it ! Think 

Of Phaeton ; yes ! and Prometheus, 

"Whose expiating tortures thou wouldst paint. 

Parehasius. 

A Socrates ! a very Socrates ! 
We now have two in Athens. 

Theon. 

Scoff not so. 
I am not worthy to be liked to him 
Whose greatness hath appalled our worthiest great. 
Not so, Parrhasius. 

Parrhasius. 
Well, he is the greater. 

Theon. 

Ay, greatest ! See in him thy best example. 
He'sought not greatness, but being greatly good, 
The gods, the world, have thrust it nobly on him. 
Oh, such a man is he, indeed, Parrhasius, 
'Tis shameful, being men, we are unlike him ! 

Parrhasius. 

"Words, Theon ! naught but idle, misspent words. 
Young as I am, I am too old to learn. 
I love°not those poor, vain, self-immolators— 
Philosophers— whose barren lives distil 
But envious gall to blight the lives of others. 
Saving thee, Theon— thee I truly honor. 
Thy friendship is most welcome ; give it still ; 
For, to be friend of such a man as thou 
Is of itself a praise too dear to squander. 

Theon. 
A seeker still, a hoarder still of praise. 



PARRHASIUS; OR, THRIFTLESS A3IBITI0N. 475 

Parrhasius. 

But for thy lessons, give me less of them, 
And I will give thee greater love. 

Theon {aside). 

Self-love ! 



Parrha 



SIUS. 



Even as thou didst speak, to freeze me from it, 

I felt my blood grow warm, my soul grow great, 

O'erteeming with my purpose ! Even now 

I feel the inspiration growing on me ; 

Coursing my veins, and filling all my being 

With strong, invigorating, strange delight. 

Dost think that now I could forego my purpose ? 

Destroy my parchment ? free my prisoner ? 

—And, by the gods, I do believe they sent him ! 

Never was so Prometheus-like a face 

And form !— Dost dream that now, and at a bidding, 

I could forswear a life-long cherished hope ? 

No ! Wouldst thou do it were the part thine own ? 

Thou lov'st Philosophy— 'tis thy life's life ! 

Canst thou forswear it ? ridicule it ? scorn it ? 

In one quick moment root from out thy heart 

The garnered harvesting of all thy past ? 

Thou wouldst ask this of me ! Do thou the same, 

A.nd I with thee join hands and — die forgotten. 

You pause ? Eeluctance clouds your face 'I Why, then, 

Prometheus and I shall live forever ! 

Stay, and behold me work. 

Theon {rising). 

And do a murder. 

Parrhasius (la uyli hig). 

Why, what is one man's life to that dear fame 

Which shall outlive the lives of centuries ? 

If thou wilt stay, 'tis well ; if not, farewell. 

And yet, methinks, the sight were worth the staying ; 

Time might grow gray nor gaze on such another. 



476 POETR Y—DRA MA TIC. 

Theon. 

Alas ! your laughter yet may be a wail, 
Your impious fame prove misery. 

Parrhasius {calling). 

Ho, Damon ! 

Theon. 

I will not stay to hear or witness more ; 

But this remember : When the time shall come 

That thy own life shall prove thy greatest curse, 

And this one deed its climax, then recall 

That once thine own hand clasped the cup of peace ; 

And when thy friend urged thee to drink, with scorn 

And laughter thou didst dash it from thee. 



Master ? 



Damon {entering). 

Theon {going). 
Farewell, Parrhasius. 

Parrhasius. 

Friend, fare thee well. 
{He conducts Theon to the door. Theon goes. Then returning, address- 
ing Damon.) 

Slave, 
The captive whom I purchased, is he fed ? 
Strengthened with wine % 

Damon. 
He has been feasted, master. 

Parrhasius. 

Feasted is well ; I would not have him weak. 

For half the misery of pain is lost 

Upon your wasted frames. Prometheus 

Was strong, and hence his agony was great. 

Damon, the captive, spite his grizzled head, 

Is strong ? At least, the wine should make him strong. 



PARRHASIUS; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION. 477 

Damon. 

He is strong, master, strong without the wine ; 
But having wine his strength seems in his tongue. 

Parrhasius. 
Tongue ? tongue ? Talks he ? 

Damon. 

Incessantly, and loud ; 
Bewails his fate, and curses us and thee. 
Tells how he is himself a freeman born ; 
At first betrayed by friends, at last by foes, 
And brought now to be sold a very slave 
Like to the very soil that nourished him. 

Parrhasius. 

Talks ? talks ? 'Tis strange I did not think of that. 

It will not do ! Talks loud, about himself ? 

Why, then, the dotard might unstring my nerves ; 

Ay, lash me with his tongue into a qualm, 

And rob me both of mastery and fame. 

Ere I should run such venture I would — Damon ! 

Damon. 

Well, master? 

Parrhasius {after a pause). 

There is one way, Damon, one ; 
Cut out his tongue, deep, to the very root. 
Go, quickly, Damon ; for the time draws nigh 
For our — yes ! our Prometheus to be tortured. 
The vultures, too, ha ! ha ! our vultures, Damon ! 
Have them in readiness unto our call. 
Mind, cut unto the root ! 

(Damon goes out. Knocking heard without.) 
Who knocks ? 

Lydia (without). 

'Tis I. 

Parrhasius {opening the door). 
My Lydia ! 



478 POETR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

Lydia {entering). 
Oh, my own Parrhasius ! 

Parrhasius. 

{Embraces her. A pause.) 

Well? 
Now, by our sweet Diana, thou art dumb, 
And yet dost look a volume of strange words. 

Lydia. 
Tell me, Parrhasius, truly, dost thou love me ? 

Parrhasius. 

As I do life — nay, more ; as I do fame. 
Dost doubt me ? 

Lydia. 

Doubt thee ? No ! and yet, Parrhasius- 
That was a foolish question that I asked ! — 
Yet, if thou lov'st me, I would — 

{She pauses as if abashed?) 

Parrhasius. 

Speak thy wishes. 
Let them be numbered as the drops of rain, 
And each a favor priceless as its balm, 
As raindrops live anew in blooming flowers, 
So shall thy wishes blossom to fulfilment. 

Lydia. 

Dear ! Listen. Thou dost know my life's poor story ; 

How like a starless night, whose dews were all 

The deep, cold damps of sorrow, it did drag 

Through childhood motherless ; through youth, by force 

Orphaned of him whose being gave my own — 

Till thou didst rise upon it like a sun, 

To gild it with thy mighty, gorgeous splendor, 

And warm it with thy love. 

Parrhasius. 

And yet one grief 
Still lingered, Lydia ; thou shouldst not forget — 



PARRHASIUS ; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION. 479 

Lydia. 

My father ? No ! 'tis he I come to speak of. 
"We thought him dead, Parrhasius ; but he lives ! 

Parkhasius. 
Lives ? 

Lydia. 

Yes, lives ! lives, and I have seen him. Oh, 
My eyes ne'er drank so dear a sight before ! 

Parrhasius. 

Nor ever have my ears drank in such music. 
Lives ? 

Lydia. 

Yes ! I passed a slave mart, all by chance, 
And there, bound like a dog, I saw him. Yes ! 
'Tis no wild vision ; no false hope, Parrhasius. 
Be patient. 

Parrhasius. 
Patient ? Bid me cease to breathe ! 

Lydia. 

At first I thought to fling myself before him, 

Proclaim him as my father, even there, 

And bid the cruel merchant bind me, too, 

Or else free him, for we should be together. 

But then there came a fear, a chilling doubt, 

That his might be a fancied likeness only. 

I sought the merchant, questioned him at length, 

And gained the proof, past doubt, that 'twas my father. 

I asked his price : Ten minae ! That was all 

I stayed to hear. I thought of thee ; flew hither, 

And found thee not, Parrhasius ! Oh, the time 

Waiting thy coming was so slow to pass, 

Each fleeting second seemed a century ! 

Parrhasius, dear Parrhasius ! Oh, my love, 

Each moment makes his cruel bondage longer ! 

Oh, let me fly to him, ransom in hand, 

And clasp him to my heart, my father ! 



480 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Paerhasius (fondly). 

Precious ! — 
What treasures the gods give us in our children ; 
Eternal benedictions on our lives ! 
Here, take the sura ; were it an hundred-fold, 
Thou couldst not ask it twice. 'Twas thine unasked. 
All that I am or would be is but thine. 

Lydia. 
As all I am is thine, Parrhasius. 

Parrhasius. 

Go! 
Lose not a moment ! Would I could go with thee ; 
But I must work, my Lydia — work for thee ! 
Now while the spirit spurs me in my breast, 
And fills me with forethoughts of victory. 

Lydia. 
Thy great Prometheus ? 

Parrhasius. 

My mighty work ! 
My masterpiece — the world's great wonder ! So, 
One, one more kiss ! Now, to thy father go ! 

(He conducts her to the door fondly. She goes out.) 
Surely she is a goddess in disguise ! 
She is more beautiful than all her kind ; 
More purely virtuous than she is fair. 

(Then closing and fastening the door.) 
But now to work. 

— Work ! work ! There is a spell 
In that one word, more potent, fame-compelling, 
More winning of the halcyon joys of heaven, 
Than the Chaldean's loud, earth-rending charms, 
Or incense incantations e'er can boast ! 
'Twas work that made a god of Hercules ! 
(Calls.) Damon ! 

Damon (entering). 
Well, master? 



It is. 



PARRI1ASIUS ; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION. 481 

Parrhasius. 

Is it done ? 
Damon. 

He cannot speak, but now he looks bis thoughts, 

Parrhasius. 

So would I have him, Damon, if bis thoughts 
Are terrible with speecbless bate and pain. 
The torturers— our vultures— are they ready ? 

Damon. 

They wait thy orders. 

Parrhasius. 

Let them enter. 
(Damon goes out and returns with two Ethiopian slaves. Parrhash s 

continues.) 

Slaves, 
Ye are my bondmen, flesb and blood, my dogs ; 
But your redemption is at band. Perform 
Your task of torture, horribly and sure, 
And tbe last breath your quivering victim draws 
Shall bid ye breathe in freedom. Only this : 
Prolong bis agony till I cry, Done ! 
If ye should fail in that, your death be dogs' ! 
Let him be brought. 

(Damon and the slams go out. Presently they return, bringing in tin 
captive, bound to a rack which is carried like a Utter. Damon is 
pale and trembles. 

Parkmiasiis. 

There, Damon, place him there, 

Where tbe bright light sball fall the strongest on him. 
So. AVby, thou'rt pale and trembling. Damon ! Go! 

(Damon goes <>>>t quickly.) 

If I can free these Ethiopian dogs, 
I should free Damon too. and so I sball. 
His part is full as hard, he more deserviner. 
(He approaches and gases upon the captive for a few moments in 
silence • tin n continues.) 
31 



482 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

There is a powerless fury in that gaze ; 
Kebellious resignation in that pose, 
"lis great ! 

Old man, though thou shalt die this life, 
Live but a little thus, and thou shalt live 
To know no death, forever on ray parchment ! 
Think, what a glorious fame, in aftertime 
To thrill the souls of mute admiring men 
With the appalling thought, that that man lived ! 
He was no dream ! he was a real Prometheus ! 

— Look at his scorn ! by all the gods, sublime ! 
Slaves, quick, begin ! Ha ! that is well ! Spare not. 
Only, beware, let him not die too soon. 
{The Ethiopians torture the captive. During the torturing Parrhasius 
paints rapidly, talking from time to time while he works.) 

— Would that my pencil had the lightning's touch, 

Quick and indelible, to catch and fix 

That flash of agony ! 

It came and went having no space of time 

Betwixt its birth and dying. 

— He smiles, even in pain, like one who smiles, 
Unconscious, in the midst of horrid dreams, 
And knows not of his own lip's mockery. 

— He writhes ! they touch his vitals ! see ! He faints ? 
Let him not die ! Wine, give him wine, you dogs ! 
So, so. Wait now till he is conscious. 

— There is no meaning in a dead man's grin, 

Save that it is an epitaph of pain. 

Prometheus was not dead, his pain was living, 

Was an eternal life ; that was its curse ! 

Yes, by the gods, it is his punishment, 

And not his sin, hath made Prometheus famous. 

— Once more, my vultures, once again your parts. 

— See ! see ! Each particle of flesh seems living ; 
And with a separate life would strive to burst 
From his torn carcass, and so fly its misery ! 
Oh, only could a god, an angered Jove, 
Dream or enforce so dread a torture ! 

— Again, wine ! wine, ye dogs ! 

Prop up his head. So. What a look was that ! 



A 



PARRHASIUS ; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION. 483- 

Were those eyes charged with lightning, they would blast me. 
He sickens with the thought that they are powerless. 

(He laughs.) 
— Again, once more, my vultures. 

— What a sigh ! 
It is as if the earth-bound spirit struggled 
A captive to the flesh, and would be free ; 
And in that moan there was a prayer for death 
So great, it might have startled Atropos, 
Pitying, to cut his ravelled skein too soon. 

— Can he be dying now ? so soon ? No ! no ! 
More wine ! feed him with life ! he must not die ! 
Spare him only a little yet, great Jove ! 

— Only a little yet, and all is done ; 

And thou shalt be at rest, old man, in death. 

Truly, I pity thee ! Thou art so strong, 

So godlike in thy harmony of strength, 

That thus to tear thee from the eyes of men 

Indeed were cruel — but that thou shouldst live, 

New-born, in my Prometheus. 

— Slaves, you tremble ? 
Beware, your wage is freedom, or 'tis death ! 
Quail not, nor let him die ere I have done ; 
For then ye should yourselves make good your failure, 
Even upon his rack, and torn as he ! 

— Ha ! so ! That look, that throe ! Sublime ! sublime ! 

Again, force him to that again, and if 

I can but fix it ! Ha ! there ! Good ! good ! good ! 

All Hades centres in that glance ! He gasps ? 

So, it is done ! Ha ! ha ! He dies ! he dies 

Well, well, 'tis not too soon ! Go, freedmen, go ! 

(The Ethiopians rush out. Paerhasius sinks into a seat, exhausted, 
laughing hysterically, and gazing triumphantly at his work.) 

Dead ! dead ! But there he lives eternally ! 



Parrhasius ! 



Lydia. 
(Without, knocking at the door.) 

Parrhasius. 
Ah! 



484 POE TR Y— DRAMA TIC. 

Lydia (without). 
Parrhasius ! 

Parrhasius. 

It is Lydia. 
She should not enter here— the body here ! 

Lydia. 

Keep me not longer from thee ! This delay 
Confirms me in my sweet surmising. Oh, 
Thou jewel of all men, my own Parrhasius ! 

Parrhasius (rising). 

By Yenus, she shall enter ! So, this curtain, 
Thou poor old man, shall be thy gorgeous pall. 

(Then standing over the body.) 
His face is calm ; he smiles as dreaming sweetly ; 
~No sign of pain, not even the cold dew 
That beaded all his brow in agony. 
Yet it was terrible ! Damon was pale 
With but the thought of it ; and the poor blacks 
Shivered unto their bones, and fled in fright 
And left him here, forgetting their last duty. 

Lydia {Jmockmg). 
Parrhasius, why, why do you keep me waiting % 

Parrhasius. 

Am I forgetful too \ Yes, Lydia. 

(He covers the body ; then opens the door.) 

Lydia. 
(Entering and embracing him.) 
Dearest ! 
Oh, I could hang forever on thy neck— 

Parrhasius. 

And there would shine a circlet all of love, 
Priceless beyond all price. But, love, thy father ? 

Lydia. 

Parrhasius, do you ask me 1 Kansomed, surely. 



PARRHASIUS ; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION. 485 

Parrhasius. 

Then I am trebly happy ! Most in thee, 
Whose delicate nature hath inwrought my life 
With a bright tale, of woes o'ercome by joys, 
In that strange, marvellous broidery, called Love. 
Next in thy father, who in having thee 
Blest me, and lives now to be blest by me. 
And, lastly, in my great Prometheus. 
But, love, where is thy father % 

Lydia. 

Guess you not ? 
Oh, speak, Parrhasius ; it is thou must answer ! 
I have been patient till I almost die. 

Parrhasius. 
You have been patient ? Why, love ? 

Lydia. 

O Parrhasius! 
Must I then weep, and yet you will not melt ? 

Parrhasius. 

Tears % tears ? This is too much ! What is it, love ? 
The dew gems of thine eyes are far too precious 
To scatter thus, and without reason. Nay, 
Look up ! What is it thou canst wish \ 

Lydia. 

My father. 

Parrhasius. 

Thy father ! What ! have you not seen him, then % 
Not ransomed him ? 

Lydia. 
He was already ransomed. 

Parrhasius. 

Already ransomed ? Did you not bespeak him ? 
He was already ransomed, love, by thee, 



486 POETRY— DRAMATIC. 

Wanting alone the silver counted down. 
The merchant would not break his word. You smile ? 
Ah ! some old friend, passing perchance like thee, 
Discovered him, and, for old friendship's sake, 
* Freed him at once from bondage ? Is't not so ? 

Lydia. 
Yes, a true friend, an unknown friend, has freed him. 

Parrhasius. 
An unknown friend \ 

Lydia. 

Unknown to him ; to me 
Known, oh, so truly, clearly ! Dear Parrhasius, 
That friend, by some strange chance winning my secret, 
Ere I had thought that it had left my keeping, 
Ransomed my father, that to him, alone, 
I still might owe my greatest, dearest blessings. 

Parrhasius. 
Thou must repay the ransom twice — ay, thrice ! 

Lydia. 

Nay ! I will pay it o'er a thousand-fold, 
In coin more precious than the purest gold, 
Yet count the reimbursement scant. Thou, thou, 
My own Parrhasius, thou didst ransom him ! 
And I can only pay thee back with love, with life. 

(Parrhasius starts, aghast, as if by some terrible thought.) 

Where is my father ? Speak ! Too long, too long- 
Have I forborne thy playing with my patience ! 
The merchant's tale was plain. Scarce had I left him, 
When thou didst pass, and — yes, it must be thus ! 
Some one who had o'erheard my talk betrayed me— 
And with no question thou didst pay the sum 
And take my father with thee. Even, Parrhasius, 
The very time that I did seek his ransom, 
He was beneath thy roof, free — freed by thee ! 
And, unkind husband, yet indeed how kind, 
You let me forth upon a fruitless search. 



PARRHASIUS; OR, THRIFTLESS AMBITION. 48? 

Yet I forgive ; for surely 'twas thy purpose 
Thus to give keener relish to my joy. 

Parrhasius (aside). 
Prometheus! Prometheus! 

Lydia {impatiently). 

xrri . , , Speak, Parrhasius ! 

Where is my father ? 

Parrhasius (as before). 

Jove, where are thy thunders \ 

Lydia. 
Parrhasius ? This— this is not well, Parrhasius. 
Thy silence chills me with a dreadful fear, 
Of what I know not— yet it crazes me ! 
Speak! Ha? 

(She sees the painting, and with a scream advances towards it, eying 

it searchingly.) 

That face ?— that seems mv father's face ' 
Oh, speak, Parrhasius ! Heard I not a groan, 
Oh, very faint, and yet so full of pain, 
Just ere I paused without the door ? Silent * 
Still silent ?— Then I did !— Was it my father's ? 
If you do love me, pity me and speak. 
—Silent ? That face ! that agony ! O gods ! 
But I will find him ! Murderer, where is he ! 

(She starts frantically, about to leave the room, and sees the corpse 
Me stops suddenly, for a moment appalled, then rushes to it and 
tvfts tlie covering.) 

This, this, this ! O ye gods, have ye no vengeance ? 
(She falls fainting on the body.) 
Parrhasius (rushing to her and raising her in his arms). 

Call clown no greater vengeance— this has crushed me. 
She does not breathe ; have I done double murder ? 

Theon (without, knocking). 
Parrhasius. 



488 POETR Y—DRA MA TIC. 

Parrhasius (not hearing). 

Oh, thou blighted, frozen lily ! 
If thou art dead, I cannot blame the gods, 
For I — I am unfit to keep thee. 

Theon (as before). 
Friend ! 

Parrhasius (still unheeding). 

Open thine eyes, though they should scorn me ! 
I would kiss thee, but that my kiss might kill thee, 
And send thy spirit, shrinking from my breath, 
Poisoned, to the remorseless shades of Hades. 
Thou wert my all ; I loved thee more than fame, 
And yet for fame have murdered thee ! O Lydia ! 

Theon (as before). 
Parrhasius. 

Parrhasius (hearing). 
Theon ? (Then after a pause.) Enter, friend. 

Theon (entering, seeing and comprehending). 

Woe ! Woe ! 

Oh, my Parrhasius ! where is now thy glory ? 

Parrhasius. 

Behold ! — thy prophecy. 

Thus do the gods 
Inflict our punishments with our own hands, 
And scourge us mortally with our own errors ! 
— O Lydia, Lydia ! 



PART Y. 
POETRY. 

SECTION II. MISCELLANEOUS. 



MY LIFE IS LIKE THE SUMMER ROSE. 

BY RICHARD HENRY WILDE. 

My life is like the summer rose 

That opens to the morning sky, 
But, ere the shades of evening close, 
Is scattered on the ground to die. 
But on that rose's humble bed 
The sweetest dews of night are shed, 
As if Heaven wept such waste to see — 
But none shall weep a tear for me. 

My life is like the autumn leaf 

That trembles in the moon's pale ray ; 
Its hold is frail — its state is brief — 

Restless and soon to pass away. 
Yet ere that leaf shall fall and fade, 
The parent tree shall mourn its shade, 
The winds bewail the leafless tree — 
But none shall breathe a sigh for me. 

My life is like the print of feet 

Left upon Tampa's desert strand ; 
Soon as the rising tide shall beat, 

The tracks will vanish from the sand. 
Yet, as if grieving to efface 
All vestige of the human race, 
On that lone shore loud moans the sea — 
But none shall e'er lament for me. 



THE POET'S LAMENT. 

BY RICHARD HENRY WILDE. 

As evening's dews to sun-parched summer flowers, 
So to young burning breasts has verse been given, 

To soothe and cool the flush of feverish hours, 

Even with the tears exhaled from earth to heaven. 

But when life's ebbing pulse wanes faint and slow, 
And coming winter clouds the short'ning day, 

No dews the night, no tears the eyes bestow, 
No words the soul to mourn its own decay. 

But frosts instead, the waste of years deform, 
And on our head falls fast untimely snow, 

Or worse — we prove volcanic passions' storm, 

Whose earthquake calmness mocks the fires below. 

These have no voice — yet might their ruins speak 
The past and present eloquently well — - 

But, fiendlike, on themselves their rage they wreak, 
Although they dare not wake the silent spell. 

For such, alas ! all Poetry is past, 

Not even in History their thoughts survive, 

Like crowded cities into lava cast 

Oblivion-doomed, embalmed, while still alive. 

Above the stifled heart a nation's grave, 

Years, centuries, millenniums even might pass, 

And o'er their barren* dust no laurels wave — 
Forth from their ashes springs no blade of grass. 

Ores in the darkest caverns of the earth, 

Pearls in the sea's unfathomed depths may shine — 

Gems in the mountain's living rock have birth — 
But never Poetry in souls like mine. 



TO THE MOCKING-BIRD. 

BY EICHAKD HENRY WILDE. 

Winged mimic of the woods ! thou motley fool ! 

Who shall thy gay buffoonery describe ? 
Thine ever-ready notes of ridicule 

Pursue tlry fellows still with jest and gibe. 

Wit, sophist, songster, Yorick of thy tribe, 
Thou sportive satirist of Nature's school ; 

To thee the palm of scoffing we ascribe, 
Arch-mocker and mad Abbot of Misrule ! 
For such thou art by day — but all night long 

Thou pour'st a soft, sweet, pensive, solemn strain, 
As if thou didst in this thy moonlight song 

Like to the melancholy Jacques complain, 
Musing on falsehood, folly, vice, and wrong, 

And sighing for thy motley coat again. 



ADIEU TO INNISFAIL. 



BY RICHARD D ALTON WILLIAMS. 



[Richard d'Alton Williams was born in Dublin, Ireland, October 8, 1822. His early 
poems were published under the nom de plume of "Shamrock." In 1848 he founded 
and edited, in conjunction with K. I. O'Doherty, the Irish Tribune; but only a few 
numbers of that journal were issued before the British Government charged the editors, 
in their capacity as such, with treason against Queen Victoria. Williams was defended, 
in the trial which followed, by the celebrated Samuel Ferguson, who, in the course of 
his remarks to the jury, said : "When I speak of the services Mr. Williams has ren- 
dered religion by his poetry, allow me also to say that he has also rendered services to 
the cause of patriotism and humanity by it; and permit me to use the privileges of a 
long apprenticeship in those pursuits by saying, that, in my own humble judgment, after 
our own poet Moore, the first living poet of Ireland is the gentleman who now stands 
arraigned at the bar." The trial resulted for Williams in a verdict of " Not guilty." 
In 1851 he emigrated to the United States. He took up his abode in Alabama, and for 
some time was Professor of Belles-Lettres in Spring Hill College. Later he married a 
Miss Connolly, of New Orleans, and moved to Thibadeaux, La., where he lived until 
the first part of the Civil War, practising medicine and writing for the local press. He 
was in sympathy with the Confederates, but did not join the army. His death occurred 
July 5, 1862.] 

Adieu ! the snowy sail 
Swells her bosom to the gale, 
And our bark from Innisfail 

Bounds away. 
While Ave gaze upon the shore 
That we never shall see more, 
And the blinding tears flow o'er 

We pray — 

3favourneen, be thou long 
In peace the queen of song — 
In battle proud and strong 

As the sea. 
Be saints thine offspring still, 
True heroes guard each hill, 
And harps by every rill 

Sound free. 

Though round her Indian bowers 
The hand of nature showers 
The brightest, blooming flowers 
Of our sphere ; 



ADIEU TO INNISFAIL. 495 

Yet not the richest rose 
In an alien clime that blows 
Like the briar at home that grows 
Is dear. 

Though glowing hearts may be 
In soft vales beyond the sea. 
Yet ever, gra/machree ! 

Shall I wail 
For the hearts of love I leave, 
In the dreary hours of eve, 
On thy stormy shores to grieve, 

Innisfail ! 

But mem'ry o'er the deep 

On her dewy wing shall sweep 

When in midnight hours I weep 

O'er thy wrongs ; 
And bring me steeped in tears 
The dead flowers of other years, 
And waft unto my ears 

Home's songs. 

"When I slumber in the gloom 
Of a nameless, foreign tomb, 
By a distant ocean's boom, 

Innisfail ! 
Around thy em'rald shore 
May the clasping sea adore, 
And each wave in thunder roar, 

" All hail ! " 

And when the final sigh 
Shall bear my soul on high, 
And on chainless wings I fly 

Through the blue ; 
Earth's latest thought shall be, 
As I soar above the sea, 
" Green Erin, dear, to thee 

Adieu ! " 



SISTER OF CHARITY. 

BY RICHARD D'ALTON WILLIAMS. 

Sister of Charity, gentle and dutiful, 

Loving as Seraphim, tender and mild, 
In humbleness strong and in purity beautiful, 

In spirit heroic, in manners a child ; 
Ever thy love, like an angel, reposes 

With hovering wings o'er the sufferer here, 
Till the arrows of death are half hidden in roses, 

And hope, speaking prophecy, smiles on the bier. 
When life like a vapor is slowly retiring, 

As clouds in the dawning to heaven uprolled, 
Thy prayer, like a herald, precedes him, expiring, 

And the cross on thy bosom his last looks behold. 
And, oh ! as the Spouse to thy words of love listens, 

What hundred-fold blessings descend on thee then ! 
Thus the flower-absorbed dew in the bright iris glistens, 

And returns to the lilies more richly again. 

Sister of Charity ! child of the Holiest ! 

Oh, for thy loving soul, ardent as pure ! 
Mother of orphans and friend of the lowliest, 

Stay of the wretched, the guilt} r , the poor ! 
The embrace of Godhead so plainly enfolds thee, 

Sanctity's halo so shrines thee around, 
Daring the eye that unshrinking beholds thee, 

Nor droops in thy presence abashed to the ground. 
Dim is the fire of the sunniest blushes 

Burning the breast of the maidenly rose, 
To the exquisite bloom that thy pale beauty flushes 

When the incense ascends and the sanctuary glows ; 
And the music that seems heaven's language is pealing, 

Adoration has bowed him in silence and sighs, 
And man, intermingled with angels, is feeling 

The passionless rapture that comes from the skies. 



SISTER OF CHARITY. 497 

Oh, that this heart, whose unspeakable treasure 

Of love hath been wasted so vainly on clay, 
Like thine, unallured by the phantom of pleasure, 

Could rend every earthly affection away ! 

And yet in thy presence the billows, subsiding, 

Obey the strong effort of reason and will ; 
And my soul, in her pristine tranquillity gliding, 

Is calm as when God bade the ocean be still ! 
Thy soothing, how gentle ! Thy pity, how tender ! 

Choir music thy voice is, thy step angel-grace, 
And thy union with Deity shrines in a splendor — 

Subdued, but unearthly, thy spiritual face. 
When the frail chains are broken, a captive that bound thee 

Afar from thy home in the prison of clay, 
Bride of the Lamb ! and Earth's shadows around thee 

Disperse in the blaze of eternity's day ; 
Still mindful, as now, of the sufferer's story, 

Arresting the thunders of wrath ere they roll, 
Intervene, as a cloud, between us and His glory, 

And shield from His lightnings the shuddering soul ; 
And mild as the moonbeams in autumn descending-. 

That lightning, extinguished by mercy, shall fall, 
While He hears, with the wail of the penitent blending, 

Thy prayer, holy daughter of Vincent de Paul. 

32 



THE FIKST AND SECOND BIRTH. 

BY JAMES T. SMITH. 

[Born in 1816 in St. Mary's Parish, La., James Tinker Smith was bereft of his 
parents at a tender age, and soon after was sent by his guardian to relatives in Scotland. 
In due time he studied at the Edinburgh University, where he had as friends Gregory and 
the great "Christopher North." He received his diploma at the age of twenty-one, from 
the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh. He then returned to his native State and 
parish, and assumed charge of the immense estates which his parents had left him. A 
first-rate French scholar, he translated into English the Meditations of Lamartine, and 
included them in a book, published in 1852, with many fugitive poems of his own. He 
died at Franklin, La., August 10, 1854.] 

Theke lay an atom in a darksome tomb, 

And there it grew till in periods nine 
It came from its hiding-place of gloom — 

A lovely babe with a face divine ; 
And it cried when it came from its lurking-place, 
For it feared to look on its father's face. 

But when it gazed all the couch around, 

And saw the kind faces that greeted it there, 

Its father, its mother, its brother it found, 
The grandmother, too, with her silvery hair — 

It laughed ; and its mother, to hear its voice, 

That a man had been born did rejoice, rejoice. 

And the babe it grew, and grew to a man, 

And it looked on the garniture spread for the earth ; 

The forests, the rivers, the mountains, he'd scan ; 
And he said, Yes, I feared on the day of my birth, 

But now I rejoice I was brought from the womb, 

That terrible place of the darkness and gloom. 

Yet he knew not then that his soul had been made 

To find yet a higher and higher doom, 
'Till the vision at night came unto him and said, 

This world, O man, is thy second womb, 
And thou must be born to another place 
Before thou canst look on thy Father's face. 



THE FIRST AND SECOND BIRTH. 499 

For this world is placed 'twixt the day and the night, 
That the eye of the man might not be destroyed ; 

By the sun of that sword he shall see flame in light, 
When he's born again from this second void, 

And then shall he see the eternal sight, 

For there ever is day, and there never is night. 

Then shalt thou fear too at thy second birth ; 

But when thou hast wakened and gazed all around, 
And see all who had formerly loved thee on earth, 

'Round thy couch stand and cry, Oh, the lost one is found r 
Thou shalt laugh ; and thy Father, to hear thy voice, 
That a god hath been born shall rejoice, rejoice ; 
And when all the delights of that heaven are unfurled 
Thou'lt rejoice to have been born from this darksome world 



THE MOTHER'S SONG. 

BY JAMES T. SMITH. 

What is sweeter than the song, 

When the lark to heaven doth soar ? 
What is sweeter than night's rest, 

When the work of day is o'er ? 
What sweeter than the sound 

Of the small waves on the shore ? 
'Tis the sound of little feet, 

As they patter on the floor. 

What is softer than the down 

Which the pretty ducklings seek, 
As they crowd the parent round 

In the pool or in the creek '( 
What is sweeter than the words 

Which the dearest friends may speak ? 
It is little baby's kiss, 

When he kisses mother's cheek. 

What is lovelier than the rose, 

As it blushes on the stalk % 
What is sweeter in the garden, 

Than the merry mocker's mock ? 
It is to hear the prattle 

Of the little baby's talk, 
And to see the tiny footprints 

When he toddles o'er the walk. 

There is music in the voice 

Of the bird upon the tree, 
There is music in the wings 

Of the little summer bee ; 
But not a chord in nature's harp, 

Though sweetly strung it be, 
Has half the music in it 

Of my baby's laugh to me. 



THE MOTHERS SONG. 501 

O Father of the innocent, 

Look from thy throne on high, 
And shield my little baby 

With the power of thine eye ! 
For often in the dreary night 

I lay me down and cry, 
To think how desolate I'd be 

Should little baby die. 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS' FAREWELL. 

(" Adieu, plaisant pays de France.'") 
BY WILLIAM PKESTON JOHNSTON. 

Farewell, beloved France ! 

I ne'er shall see thee more ; 
I cast my last fond glance 

On thy receding shore. 
Fast fall the salt, salt tears, 

That dim my aching eyes, 
And spectral forms and fears 

Dark o'er my pathway rise. 

Before me soon the steeps 

Of England's cliffs will loom, 
And seem to her who weeps 

The portals of a tomb ; 
And Scotland's rugged crags 

Will vex my hapless sight, 
While this winged dungeon drags 

Mary from lost delight. 

No more thy joys, dear France, 

The idle hours beguile ; 
No more the pleasant dance 

Provokes the wreathed smile ; 
Now gone are sportive words, 

The laugh, the tale, the song, 
Sunshine and flowers and birds, 

And pleasure's shining throng. 

Whate'er filled eye and ear, 

Whate'er cheered heart and mind, 

Whate'er seemed most, most dear, 
Wretched I leave behind ; 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS' FAREWELL. 503 

O life so sweet, so gay, 

With bliss so brimming o'er ! 
O rapture passed away, 

Never to bless me more ! 

Gone now the airy jest, 

The shapely, graceful mien 
Of nobles who addressed 

Each woman as a queen ; 
Instead, stern Murray's form, 

Dark, rigid, clad in mail, 
And lowering as the storm, 

Stalks by with aspect pale. 

Instead of bending priest, 

With whisper soft and low, ' 
Absolving me, released 

Henceforth from sin and woe, 
Knox, with his strident voice 

And awful threatening- arm, 
Points to the dreadful choice 

Of heresy or harm. 

Born of a kingly line, 

Brave, beautiful, and strong, 
What baleful planets shine, 

What great misfortunes throng, 
To mar the princely grace, 

To dim the splendid sheen, 
Of Scotland's royal race, 

Of Scotland's stricken queen ! 

Upon the deck I stand, 

And through the twilight strain 
To see again thy strand 

Across the billowy main ; 
But o'er the dark expanse, 

Mist shrouds thee from my view, 
O home ! O hope ! O France ! 

My France ! a last adieu ! 



EDGAR ALLAN POE. 



BY JOHN DIMITRY. 



Edgar Allan Poe, 

Poet and Prose-Writer : 

He struck with mocking hand the Frailty that is Man, 

While he left unprofaned 

The Truth that is God. 

He wooed Science to be an Ally of Fiction, 

And, in the wooing, made her shine with a Light 

Simpler than her own. 

In his Poetry, he touched but few Notes : 

Yet these, now the tenderest, now the saddest, 

That translate Human Passions 

Into melodious words, 

And so fix them forever. 

In his Prose, Master of all the Feelings, 

He wielded, with equal skill, 

The Wand of Humor and the Brand of Terror : 

At his will, thrilling men to Horror, or moving them 

To Laughter. 

In his Tales — 

Whether they be Sombre, or wild unto Grotesqueness, 

Religion can find no Offence, Virtue no Wrong, 

Nor Innocence take alarm. 

He passed a Life tragic enough to serve for Warning, 

Stinging his generation into Wrath, and by it stung into Frenzy ; 

Yet, through his Genius, lifted victorious above Detraction, 

Lie has happily made sure of 

Posterity. 



THE EXILE TO HIS WIFE. 

BY JOSEPH BRENNAN. 

[Born in the North of Ireland in 1829, Joseph Brennan spent the greater part of 
his childhood and youth in Cork. In 1848, after joining the Young Ireland Party, he 
became one of the editors of the Irish Felon. After his release from a ten months' 
imprisonment in Dublin and in Belfast, he was made editor of the Irishman, but did 
not hold this position long before he was implicated in a revolutionary movement that 
constrained him to fly to America. He found an exile's home in New Orleans, where he 
was for several years connected with the Delta and with the True Delta. He died in that 
city ere he attained his thirtieth year.] 

Come to me, dearest, I'm lonely without thee. 
Day-time and night-time, I'm thinking about thee ; 
Night-time and day-time, in dreams I behold thee ; 
Unwelcome the waking which ceases to fold thee. 
Come to me, darling, my sorrows to lighten ; 
Come in thy beauty to bless and to brighten ; 
Come in thy womanhood, meekly and lowly ; 
Come in thy lovingness, queenly and holy. 

Swallows will flit 'round the desolate ruin, 
Telling of spring and its joyous renewing, 
And thoughts of thy love and its manifold treasure 
Are circling my heart with a promise of pleasure. 
O Spring of my spirit ! O May of my bosom ! 
Shine out on my soul, till it bourgeon and blossom j 
The waste of my life has a rose-root within it, 
And thy fondness alone to the sunshine can win it. 

Figure that moves like a song through the even, 
Features lit up by a reflex of heaven ; 
Eyes like the skies of poor Erin, our mother, 
Where shadow and sunshine are chasing each other ; 
Smile coming seldom, but childlike and simple, 
Planting in each rosy cheek a sweet dimple ; — 
Oh, thanks to the Saviour, that even thy seeming 
Is left to the exile to brighten his dreaming ! 



50G POETR Y—MISCELLANEO US. 

You have been glad when you knew I was gladdened ; 
Dear, are you sad now to hear I am saddened ? 
Our hearts ever answer in tune and in time, love, 
As octave to octave, and rhyme unto rhyme, love. 
I cannot weep but your tears will be flowing, 
You cannot smile but my cheek will be glowing. 
I would not die without you at my side, love ; 
You will not linger when I shall have died, love. 

Come to me, dear, ere I die of my sorrow, 
Rise on my gloom like the sun of to-morrow — 
Strong, swift, and fond as the words which I speak, love, 
With a song on your lip, and a smile on your cheek, love. 
Come, for my heart in your absence is weary ; 
Haste, for my spirit is sickened and dreary. 
Come to the arms which alone should caress thee, 
Come to the heart that is throbbing to press thee. 



LORD, KEEP MY MEMOEY GREEN! 

BY ANNA PEYRE DINNIES. 

[Anna Peyre (Shackleford) Dinnies was born in Georgetown, S. C, in 1816. In 
1830 she was married to John C. Dinnies, of St. Louis, Mo.-, and resided in that city 
until 1846, when the family removed to New Orleans. Under the pen-name of " Moina," 
both before and after her marriage, she wrote many poems which attracted attention. 
She contributed to the leading periodicals of the South, and depicted the beauty of the 
home affections in melodious verse. She died in New Orleans, August 8, 1886.] 

In the shifting scenes of life, 

Filled with sorrow, toil, and strife, 

Ma} r no shadow overcast 

Those through which my soul has past 1 

May no fabled Lethe pour 

Its dark waves my memory o'er ; 

Hiding aught of pain or care 

God has traced in wisdom there ! 

On the tablets of my brain, 
Ever let the pcbst remain ; 
"Wrong and suffering, deeply felt, 
Still by Mercy's hand were dealt ; 
And the keenest pang I've known 
Came from the Almighty's throne, 
Some blessed mission to fulfil — 
Humble pride, or save from ill ! 

Good and evil — weal and woe — 
From the same pure fountain flow, 
Though their purposes may be 
Hidden from humanity ! 
Blessings visible no more 
Tell, than griefs which we endure, 
Truths, which all things serve to prove, 
God is justice ! — God is love ! 

This our Faith divinely teaches — 
This Experience ever preaches — 



508 POE TR Y—MISCELLANEO US. 

This the lesson Reason draws, 

When on Time's swift course we pause — 

This the firm conviction given, 

Through communings oft with Heaven ; 

Bidding us when all is seen, 

Ask, " Lord, keep my memory green ! " 



THE WIFE. 

BY ANNA PEYRE DINNIES. 

I could have stemmed misfortune's tide, 

And borne the rich one's sneer — 
Have braved the haughty glance of pride, 

Nor shed a single tear ; 
I could have smiled on every blow 

From life's full quiver thrown, 
While I but gaze on thee, and know 

I shall not be " alone." 

I could— I think I could — have brooked, 

E'en for a time, that thou 
Upon my fading face hadst looked 

With less of love than now ; 
For then I should at least have felt 

The sweet hope still my own 
To win thee back, and, whilst I dwelt 

On earth, not been " alone." 

But thus to see from day to day 

Thy brightening eye and cheek, 
And watch thy life-sands waste away, 

Unnumbered, slow, and meek ; 
To meet thy smiles of tenderness, 

And catch the feeble tone 
Of kindness, ever breathed to bless, 

And feel I'll be " alone " ; 

To mark thy strength each hour decay, 

And yet thy hopes grow stronger, 
As, filled with heavenward trust, they say 

Earth may not claim thee longer ; 
Nay, dearest, 'tis too much — this heart 

Must break when thou art gone ; 
It must not be ; we must not part ; 

I could not live " alone." 



POWERS'S GREEK SLAVE. 

BY ANNA PEYRE DINNIES. 

Move gently, gently — Galatea lives ! 

Again hath Genius waked to life the stone ! 
Art, with creative touch, here Beauty gives, 

And matchless Grace and Purity are shown ! 
Mark the expression on her brow and cheek, 
And start not if those parted lips should speak. 

Gently, ay, gently, in her presence move ; 

A sacred thing is sorrow such as hers ! 
For, though her Christian faith its depth reprove, 

Its hushed emotion every feature stirs. 
The swelling nostril, and the lip's slight curl, 
Betray thy struggles, hapless, captive girl ! 

Thy faultless figure in its perfect grace 
Charms but a moment as Ave lift our eyes 

Up to the holier beauty of thy face, 

Where the sad history of thy young life lies ; 

Engraven on each lineament serene 

Is what thou art — what once thy fate has been ! 

Beloved — how deeply, let thy beauty tell ! 

Wooed— as fair maids are ever wooed and won ! 
Torn from thy early home, where loved ones dwell, 

And placed in chains — for men to gaze upon ! 
Deep is thy grief, young girl ! but strength is given 
To bear its burthen by thy trust in Heaven ! 

Yes ! strength is given by that faith divine, 
To thy proud spirit, to sustain its woe, 

And through thy lovely features still to shine, 
Yeiling their beauty in its own mild glow ; 

While every shade seems so instinct with life, 

We deem thee living — like Pygmalion's wife. 



THE WILD LILY AND THE PASSION-FLOWER 

BY ADRIEN KOUQUETTE. 

[ Adrien Emmanuel Rouquette was born in New Orleans, February 13, 1813. Sent 
to France during his youth, he was educated at the College de Nantes, making a 
special study while there of the Greek and Latin classics. On leaving college, he spent 
ten years in visiting the various capitals of Europe ; then he returned to this country 
and devoted himself for awhile to the study of law. Later he took up his residence in 
St. Tammany Parish, La., and ministered to the needs of the Choctaw Indians, in whose 
welfare and destiny he had become especially interested. In 1845 he was ordained a 
priest of the Roman Catholic Church, and converted many Indian tribes to that ancient 
faith. His best poetry is written in French, but his English lyrics are deserving of high 
praise. His brother, Dominique Francois, who was, undoubtedly, the greater poet, was 
also learned in English, but composed poetry exclusively in French. Speaking of these 
remarkable brothers, Professor Alcee Fortier says : " From their earliest youth they held 
in their hands the lute and the lyre, and in old age the language of poetry seemed to 
be natural to them. . . . They lived in solitary Bonfouca, in the magnificent pine 
forest watered by those romantic rivulets, the Tchefuncte, the Bogue-Falaya, and 
Bayou Lacombe. Around them were the remnants of the Choctaws, the faithful allies 
of the French ; and in the wigwams of the Indians, the brothers used to sit to smoke the 
calumet with the chiefs, or to look at the silent squaws skilfully weaving the wicker 
baskets which they were to sell the next morning at the noisy ' Marche Francais.' Father 
Rouquette's works include : Les Savanea (1841) ; Wild Floicers ; Sacred Poetry (1848) ; 
La TJiebaide en Amerique (1852) ; L'Antonaide (1860) ; Poemes Patriotiques (1860) ; 
Catherine Tegchkwitha (1873). His last work was a satire on George W. Cable's The 
Crandissimea, entitled, Critical Dialogue between Aboo and Caboo on a New Booh ; or, A 
Qrandissime Ascension. Father Rouquette died in New Orleans, July 15, 1887.] 

Sweet flow'r of light, 
The queen of solitude, 

The image bright 
Of grace-born maidenhood, 

Thou risest tall, 
Midst struggling weeds that droop : 

Thy lieges all, 
They humbly bow and stoop ! 

Dark-colored flow'r, 
How solemn, awful, sad ! — 

I feel thy pow'r, 
O king, in purple clad > 



512 POETR Y—MISCELLANEO US. 

With head recline, 
Thou art the emblem dear 

Of woes divine ; 
The flow'r I most revere ! 

The lily white, 
The purple passion-flow'r, 

Mount Thabor bright, 
The gloomy Olive-bow' r. 

Such is our life — 
Alternate joys and woes, 

Short peace, long strife, 
Few friends, and many foes ! 

My friend, away 
All wailings here below : 

The ROYAL WAY 

To realms above is woe ! 



33 



TO NATURE, MY MOTHER. 

BY ADRIEN ROUQUETTE. 

O Nature, powerful, smiling, calm, 

To my unquiet heart, 
Thy peace distilling as a balm, 

Thy mighty life impart. 

Nature, mother, still the same, 
So lovely mild with me, 

To live in peace, unsung by fame, 
Unchanged I come to thee ; 

1 come to live as saints have lived, 

I fly where they have fled, 
By men unholy never grieved, 
In prayer my tears to shed. 

Alone with thee, from cities far, 
Dissolved each earthly tie ; 

By some divine magnetic star 
Attracted still on high. 

Oh, that my heart, inhaling love 

And life with ecstasy, 
From this low world to worlds above 

Could rise exultingly ! 



TO A MINIATURE. 



BY JOHN W. OVERALL. 



[John Wilford Overall was born in the Shenandoah Valley, Va., September 25, 1822. 
In early manhood he went to New Orleans, where he was, for a while, on the staff of the 
City Printer. Subsequently he became editor of the Daily Delta, and then of the Daily 
True Delta. He has also been editorially associated with the press of Mobile, Richmond, 
Galveston, and St. Louis. Since 1876 he has resided in New York, where he has been 
for several years the literary editor of the Mercury. In his Catechism of the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, he holds the fundamental doctrine that "delegated power is 
not sovereign powers: it is a trust!" He is a poet of no low order, and during the Civil 
War he added some stirring lyrics to the verse of that martial time.] 

'Tis strange that Art can weave a face 

So radiant and divine, 
So eloquent with thought and grace, 

So beautiful as thine. 
I almost see the warm blood seek 

The blue veins on thy brow, 
And glow upon thy pearly cheek — 

So life-like seemest thou. 

I love thy dark eye's sunny glee ; 

There's something in its glance 
That tells thy heart is fond and free, 

And full of love's romance. 
The dimpled lake, the sky's soft glow, 

Can no such charms impart, 
As those which thou dost mutely throw 

Around the burning heart. 

And o'er that bosom, white as snow, 

Entwined in thy fair finger, 
Dark, dreamy silken ringlets flow, 

As if they loved to linger ; 
And blest as heaven are they blest, 

Rocked in their sea- wave motion, 
Like shadows on the tiny breast 

Of some sweet mimic ocean. 



TO A MINIATURE. 515 

Oh, couldst thou break the silent spell 

That binds thy lips so long, 
Each soft, enchanting tone would tell 

That thou wert born for song ! 
To me, Art's melody but mocks — 

For in the gilded South, 
The softest, sweetest music-box 

Is woman's rosy mouth ! 

How fair these daughters of the sun, 

These black-eyed, sparkling things, 
These jewels of the Holy One, 

These angels without wings ! 
One golden look, one crystal tear, 

One sweet emphatic w T ord, 
Is worth the wealth of Ind, so dear, 

Or all we've seen or heard. 

Lo ! dreams of love fled by, yet sweet, 

Come back to me again, 
Like parted angels when they meet 

In Aiden's dear domain. 
And gazing in those orbs of light, 

Did I but know thee, girl, 
I'd brave the battle's fiercest fight, 

For one bright smile or curl ! 



THE BARDS. 

BY JOHN W. OVERALL. 

In their high heroic measure, 

In their high heroic truth, 
Live the bards throughout all ages, 

In the quenchless fire of youth ; 
We revel in their visions, 

And we love the songs they sing, 
When they strike the harp of glory 

Like the Israelitish king. 

They have read the starry heavens — 

These diviners of the stars — 
Read Uranus and the Pleiades, 

And the fiery planet Mars ; 
They have soared among the planets, 

They have swept the fields of Time ; 
They have soared up in the spirit — 

Bards heroic and sublime ! 

And they gather from the planets, 

Where their spirit-feet have trod, 
Light and supernal wisdom, 

And a lucid proof of God ; 
And feel the truth eternal 

O'er their yearning spirits steal, 
That the Real is the Ideal, 

That the Ideal is the Real ! 

They come, like John the Baptist, 

In the wilderness of Thought, 
Preaching in the world's Judaea 

What the holy Teacher taught ; 
They come with lips of wisdom, 

And they strike the sounding lyre — 
Lips radiant with the glow of love 

And high prophetic fire. 



THE BARDS. 517 



They summon white-browed Helen 

From the old-forgotten strife, 
And Plataea's men, and Marathon's, 

To the vestibule of life. 
We see the glittering of the steel 

Under the Latian stars, 
The beaks of the Roman eagles, 

And the red, round shield of Mars. 

They tell of brave old legends, 

Legends of the priestly age ; 
Of ladye fair, with golden hair, 

Courtly peer and gentle page. 
We see the knights and barons 

Coming forth in martial line, 
And Richard of the Lion-heart 

On the plains of Palestine. 

We mark the pennon and the plume, 

We see the shivering lance, 
And Cressy with its bowmen, 

And the troubadours of France. 
We mark the knights at Chevy Chase, 

We see the banners fly, 
And the royal Stuart riding down 

To Flodden Hill to die. 

Ah ! the Past with all its visions 

Comes before us in its prime — 
All the olden, golden glory 

Of the golden, olden time. 
Thus in high heroic measure, 

And in high heroic truth, 
Live the bards throughout all ages, 

In the quenchless fire of youth. 

Unlike the men who speak alone 

For the passing things of time, 
The bards speak for all ages 

In the lofty words of rhyme. 
Not for the coming morrow, 

Not for the brief to-day, 
Stir the bards the harp's wild pulses, 

Sing the bards their noble lay. 



518 PQETBY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

And they die not, these heroic bards, 

They live on with the stars, 
With Uranus and the Pleiades, 

And the fiery planet Mars. 
They are spirits of Earth and Aiden, 

Earth and Aiden hear them sing, 
When they strike the harp of glory, 

Like the Israelitish king. 



AT THE TIIEATKE. 



BY HENRY LYNDEN FLASH. 



[Henry Lynden Flash was born in Cincinnati, 0., January 20, 1835. He is a 
graduate of the Western Military Institute of Kentucky. He was engaged, for about 
twenty years following the Civil War, in mercantile pursuits in New Orleans. He then 
removed to Los Angeles, Cal., where he still resides. His only book, Poems (18G0). 
deserves to be better known. Mr. J. Wood Davidson, in The Living Writers of the 
South (18G9), says : " Mr. Flash's power of antithesis is unequalled in the South. Rapid 
condensation, quick suggestion, and a masterly choice of expressive words mark all he 
has written. In these qualities he stands nearer to Owen Meredith than does any other 
living poet."] 

I entered the lobby, dreaming a dream, 

As Marco, cruel and cold, 
Pressed her snowy hand on the marble heart 

That had jnst been bought and sold ; 
But my spirit was off on a journey then, 

To the happy days of old. 

Step by step did it slowly go, 

Down the silent yesterdays, 
Till it came to a year that was bright with love 

And all the months were Mays, 
And it met a spirit purer far 

Than those you see in plays. 

The house was crowded then as now, 

And some were pale with fear 
As they watched the play, and in many an eye 

Was a tender, pitying tear, 
As Cordelia, dead in her stainless robes, 

Was borne in the arms of Lear. 

I turned away from the saddening sight, 

And staggered with surprise, 
As I met the wonderful light that flowed 

From Maud's immaculate eyes ; 
Our hearts met then — they will meet again 

In the bowers of paradise. 



520 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

Twelve months of May, and then, alas ! 

The blast came bleak and chill ! 
It killed the rose upon her cheek, 

The lily pleaded still ; 
In vain the prayer — she sleeps beneath 

The willow on the hill. 

And while the actors play their parts, 
My soul takes up its woe, 

And with its burden travels back 
To the buried long ago — 

To the happy dreamland of my life, 
Where roses always blow. 

And now, while others watch the play, 

I visit my spirit wife, 
And pray that the Tragedy may end, 

With its pitiless pain and strife — 
That my darling and I may meet again 

In everlasting life. 



WHAT SHE BROUGHT ME. 

BY HENRY LYNDEN FLASH. 

This faded flower that you see 

Was given me a year ago, 
By one whose little dainty hand 

Is whiter than the snow. 

Her eyes are blue as violets, 

And she's a blonde, and very fair, 

And sunset tints are not as bright 
As is her golden hair. 

And there are roses in her cheeks 
That come and go like living things ; 

Her voice is softer than the brook's 
That flows from hidden springs. 

She gave it me with downcast eyes, 

And rosy flushes of the cheek, 
That told of tender thoughts her tongue 

Had never learned to speak. 

The fitting words had just been said, 
And she was mine as long as life ; 

I gently laid the flower aside, 
And kissed my blushing wife. 

She took it up with earnest look, 
And said, " Oh, prize the flower," — 

And tender tears were in her eyes — 
" It is my only dower." 

She brought me Faith, and Hope, and Truth,. 

She brought me gentle thoughts and love, 
A soul as pure as those that float 

Around the throne above. 



522 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

But earthly things she nothing had, 
Except this faded flower you see ; 

And though 'tis worthless in your eyes, 
"lis very dear to me. 



WHO CAN TELL? 

BY HENRY LYNDEN FLASH. 

She lived a life of sin and shame, 

Spurned by the fool, shunned by the good- 
A withered hope, a blasted name, 

A blighted womanhood. 

She died within a loathsome den, 
Unwept-for to the grave was borne, 

While sleek-cheeked, pious hypocrites 
Sneered with a smile of scorn, 

And said, " This is the end of sin, 

And Satan now has claimed his own." 
Forgetting Christ — " He that is pure, 
Let him first cast a stone." 

" Judge not, lest ye be judged," he said ; 

And e'en the thief upon the cross 
Gave up his life in penitence — 

A gainer by the loss. 

And gentle Mercy pleads for all, 

And she perhaps may dwell 
Up with the singing hosts of heaven — 

Peace, bigot ! who can tell ? 



THE BONNIE BLUE FLAG.* 

We are a band of brothers, and natives to the soil, 

Fighting for the property we gained by honest toil ; 

And when our rights were threatened, the cry rose near and far,, 

Hurrah for the bonnie Blue Flag that bears the single star ! 

chorus : 

Hurrah ! hurrah ! for the bonnie Blue Flag 
That bears the single star. 

As long as the Union was faithful to her trust, 

Like friends and like brothers, kind were we and just ; 

But now, when Northern treachery attempts our rights to mar, 

We hoist on high the bonnie Blue Flag that bears the single star. 

First gallant South Carolina nobly made the stand ; 

Then came Alabama, who took her by the hand ; 

Next quickly Mississippi, Georgia, and Florida — 

All raised the flag, the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star. 

Ye men of valor, gather round the banner of the right ; 
Texas and fair Louisiana join us in the fight. 
Davis, our loved President, and Stephens, statesmen are ; 
Now rally round the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star. 

And here's to brave Virginia ! The Old Dominion State 
With the young Confederacy at length has linked her fate. 
Impelled by her example, now other States prepare 
To hoist on high the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star. 

Then here's to our Confederacy ! Strong we are and brave ; 
Like patriots of old we'll fight, our heritage to save ; 
And rather than submit to shame, to die we would prefer ; 
So cheer for the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star. 

* [This popular Southern war ballad was composed by the actor Harry McCarthy, 
and was sung by his sister at the New Orleans Varieties Theatre in the early part of the- 
Civil War.] 



THE BONNIE BLUE FLAG. 525 

Then cheer, boys, cheer ! raise the joyous shout, 

For Arkansas and North Carolina now have both gone out ; 

And let another rousing cheer for Tennessee be given. 

The single star of the bonnie Blue Flag has grown to be eleven ! 



MY MARYLAND. 



BY JAMES R. RANDALL. 



[James Ryder Randall was born in Baltimore, Md., January 1, 1836. In youth he 
studied at Georgetown College. He first became well known in Louisiana as editor of 
the Pointe Coupee Banner. At a later date he was employed on the staff of the New 
Orleans Sunday Delta. In this journal appeared his famous My Maryland, which has 
been called the Marseillaise of the Confederate cause. In 1866 he became editor-in- 
chief of the Augusta (Ga.) Constitutionalist.'] 

The despot's heel is on thy shore, 

Maryland ! 

His torch is at thy temple door, 

Maryland ! 

Avenge the patriotic gore 

That flecked the streets of Baltimore, 

And be the battle-queen of yore, 

Maryland ! My Maryland ! 

Hark to an exiled son's appeal, 

Maryland ! 

My Mother-State, to thee I kneel, 

Maryland ! 

For life and death, for woe and weal, 

Thy peerless chivalry reveal, 

And gird thy beauteous limbs with steel, 

Maryland ! My Maryland ! 

Thou wilt not cower in the dust, 

Maryland ! 

Thy beaming sword shall never rust, 

Maryland ' 

Remember Carroll's sacred trust, 

Remember Howard's warlike thrust, 

And all thy slumberers with the just, 

Maryland ! My Maryland ! 



M Y MARYLAND. 527 

Come ! 'tis the red dawn of the day, 

Maryland ! 
Come ! with thy panoplied array, 

Maryland ! 
With Ringgold's spirit for the fray, 
"With Watson's blood at Monterey, 
With fearless Lowe and dashing May, 

Maryland ! My Maryland ! 

Come ! for thy shield is bright and strong, 

Maryland ! 
Come ! for thy dalliance does thee wrong, 

Maryland ! 
Come ! to thine own heroic throng, 
That stalks with Liberty along, 
And ring thy dauntless slogan-song, 

Maryland ! My Maryland ! 

Dear Mother ! burst the tyrant's chain, 

Maryland ! 
Virginia should not call in vain, 

Maryland I 
She meets her sisters on the plain — 
"Sic semper" 'tis the proud refrain 
That baffles minions back amain, 

Maryland ! 
Arise, in majesty again, 

Maryland ! My Maryland I 

I see the blush upon thy cheek, 

Maryland ! 
For thou wast ever bravely meek, 

Maryland ! 
But lo ! there surges forth a shriek 
From hill to hill, from creek to creek — 
Potomac calls to Chesapeake, 

Maryland ! My Maryland I 

Thou wilt not yield the vandal toll, 

Maryland ! 
Thou wilt not crook to his control, 

Maryland ! 



528 POETE Y—M1SCELLANE0 US. 

Better the fire upon thee roll, 
Better the shot, the blade, the bowl, 
Than crucifixion of the soul, 

Maryland ! My Maryland ! 

I hear the distant thunder hum, 

Maryland ! 

The Old Line bugle, fife, and drum, 

Maryland ! 

She is not dead, nor deaf, nor dumb — 

Huzza ! she spurns the Northern scum ! 

She breathes — she burns ! she'll come ! she'll come ! 
Maryland ! My Maryland ! 



JOHN PELHAM. 



BY JAMES R. EANDALL. 



Just as the spring came laughing through the strife, 

With all its gorgeous cheer ; 
In the bright April of historic life 

Fell the great cannoneer. 

The wondrous lulling of a hero's breath 

His bleeding country weeps ; 
Hushed in the alabaster arms of death, 

Our young Marcellus sleeps. 

Nobler and grander than the Child of Rome, 

Curbing his chariot steeds, 
The knightly scion of a Southern home 

Dazzled the land with deeds. 

Gentlest and bravest in the battle brunt, 

The champion of the truth, 
He bore his banner to the very front 

Of our immortal youth. 

A clang of sabres 'mid Virginian snow, 

The fiery pang of shells — 
And there's a wail of immemorial woe 

In Alabama dells. 

The pennon drops that led the sacred band 

Along the crimson field ; 
The meteor blade sinks from the nerveless hand 
Over the spotless shield. 

We gazed and gazed upon that beauteous face, 

While 'round the lips and eyes, 
Couched in the marble slumber, flashed the grace 
Of a divine surprise. 
34 



530 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

Oh, mother of a blessed soul on high ! 

Thy tears may soon be shed — 
Think of thy boy with princes of the sky, 

Among the Southern dead. 

How must he smile on this dull world beneath, 

Fevered with swift renown- 
He — with the martyr's amaranthine wreath 

Twining the victor's crown ! 



IN MEMOKIAM * 

BY JOHN DIMITRY. 

Behind this Stone is laid 
For a Season, 

ALBERT SYDNEY JOHNSTON: 

A General in the Army of the Confederate States, 
Who fell at Shiloh, Tennessee, 
On the sixth day of April, a.d. 
Eighteen hundred and sixty-two. 
A man tried in many high offices 
And critical Enterprises, 
And found faithful in all ; 
His life was one long Sacrifice of Interest to Conscience ; 
And even that life, on a woeful Sabbath, 
Did he yield as a Holocaust at his Country's Need. 
Not wholly understood was he while he lived ; 
But, in his death, his Greatness stands confessed 
In a People's tears. 
Resolute, moderate, clear of envy, yet not wanting 
In that finer Ambition which makes men great and pure ; 
In his Honor — impregnable ; 
In his Simplicity — sublime ; 
No Country e'er had a truer Son — no Cause a nobler Champion ; 
No People a bolder Defender — no Principle a purer Victim, 
Than the dead Soldier 
Who sleeps here ! 
The Cause for which he perished is lost — 
The People for whom he fought are crushed — 
The Hopes in which he trusted are shattered — 
The Flag he loved guides no more the charging lines ; 
But his Fame, consigned to the keeping of that Time, which, 
Happily, is not so much the Tomb of Virtue as its Shrine, 
Shall, in the years to come, fire Modest Worth to Noble Ends. 
In honor, now, our great Captain rests ; 

* [Lord Palmerston pronounced this epitaph " a modern classic, Ciceronian in its 
language."] 



532 POETR Y—MISCELLA NEO US. 

A bereaved People mourn him ; 

Three Commonwealths proudly claim him ; 

And History shall cherish him 

Among those Choicer Spirits, who, holding their Conscience unmixed 

with blame, 
Have been, in all Conjunctures, true to themselves, their People, and 

their God. 



ZOLLICOFFER. 

BY HENRY LYNDEN FLASH. 

First in the fight, and first in the arms 
Of the white-winged angels of glory, 

With the heart of the South at the feet of God, 
And his wounds to tell the story. 

And the blood that flowed from his hero heart, 
On the spot where he nobly perished, 

Was drunk by the earth as a sacrament 
In the holy cause he cherished. 

In heaven a home with the brave and blessed, 

And, for his soul's sustaining, 
The apocalyptic eyes of Christ ; 

And nothing on earth remaining — 

But a handful of dust in the land of his choice, 

A name in song and story, 
And Fame to shout with her brazen voice, 

" Died on the Field of Glory ! " 



" STONEWALL " JACKSON. 

BY HENRY LYNDEN FLASH. 

Not 'midst the lightning of the stormy fight, 
Not in the rush upon the vandal foe, 

Did kingly death, with his resistless might, 
Lay the great leader low ! 

His warrior soul its earthly shackles bore 
In the full sunshine of a peaceful town ; 

When all the storm was hushed, the trusty oak 
That propped our cause went down. 

Though his alone the blood that flecks the ground, 
Recording all his grand, heroic deeds, 

Freedom herself is writhing with his wound, 
And all the country bleeds. 

He entered not the nation's " Promised Land," 
At the red belching of the cannon's mouth ; 

But broke the " House of Bondage " with his hand- 
The Moses of the South ! 

Oh, gracious God ! not gainless is our loss : 
A glorious sunbeam gilds Thy sternest frown ; 

And while his country staggers with the cross — 
He rises with the crown ! 



LINES TO THE MEMORY OF FATHER TURGIS. 

BY T. WHARTON COLLENS. 

March weaponless and think of God, 

Muffle the roll of war's tambour, 
Dig me a grave beneath the sod, 

And have me buried with the poor. 

So spoke the holy priest and died. 
Let no mausoleum rise in pride 
O'er where his sacred bones repose, 
But mark the humble grave he chose 
With the Redeemer's cross of wood — 
Glorious, though 'tis low and rude. 

No sword bore he 'midst battling hosts ; 
Yet when the lines of bayonets 
Met with their deadly clash and thrust, 
When howling balls and whizzing bullets 
Swept, gathering harvest o'er the plain, 
There niong the wounded and the slain, 
While boomed the deep artillery, 
While blazed the rattling musketry, 
While fire and smoke rose round the brave, 
While mingled blood of friend and foe 
Gushed out with groans of death and woe — 
There went the Christian priest to save, 
To save — to bring the bread of life, 
Reclaim a soul from hell and strife. 

From bleeding form to bleeding form, 
Resigned, devoted, through the storm, 
Seeking God's own, here, there he ran, 
This gentle one, this unarmed man ; 
Fearless he strove, nor prayed release, 
This chieftain of the Prince of Peace. nn 

Father ! haste thee from this deadly field ; 
Leave us in our blood — there is no shield 
To screen thy holy breast. Farewell ! 



536 POE TR Y—3IISCELLA NEO US. 

— Nay, nay ! my son, for here I tell 
Of Him who lifts a living soul 
From dying flesh ; and to the goal 
Of heaven's glory bears it up 
To drink of his eternal cup. 
Come ! list of Christ the pressing call ! 
Think not of me ; for, if I fall, 
Our comrades, flushed with victory, 
On morrow's dawn, in triumph's glee, 
Will bear us hence with thoughts of God, 
Muffle the clang of war's tambour, 
Dig us a grave beneath the sod, 
And leave us buried with the poor. 

Yea, with the poor, the blessed ones, 
Whose hearts yearned not for worldly wealth ; 
But cheerful hoped for heavenly thrones. 
And died unknown to all the earth. 

No records here their memories keep, 
Their graves deserted none can tell ; 
But when on clouds comes Jesus bright, 
When the proud men shall sink to hell, 
The levelled ground where now they sleep 
Will burst with rays of dazzling light, 
And let their shining bodies rise 
To meet their Saviour in the skies. 

Follow this humble corpse, ye braves, 
With whom 'twas once a tender, cheering friend- 
A voice that told the truth that saves — 
A hand that led where honor could attend. 
Follow ! ye chiefs and men of fame, 
Follow ! ye mothers of the dead, 
Follow ! his name outshines your name — 
His meek and venerable head 
Has won a fairer wreath than yours : 
Yours of country, his of heaven ! 
Follow ! while forth his spirit soars 
Triumphant, to its higher haven. 
Follow unarmed and think of God. 
Muffle the beat of war's tambour, 
Dig him a grave beneath the sod, 
And leave him buried with the poor. 



O, TEMPORA ! O, MORES ! 

BY J. DICKSON BRUNS. 

[John Dickson Bruns was born in Charleston, S. C, February 24, 1836. At the age 
of twenty-one, he took his M.D. degree from the Medical College of Charleston. Dur- 
ing the Civil War he was Surgeon of a General Hospital of the Confederacy. In 1866 he 
was chosen Professor of Physiology and Pathology in the New Orleans School of Medi- 
cine. His poetical writings evince graceful versification and marked power of descrip- 
tion. He died in New Orleans, May 20, 1883.] 

" Great Pan is dead ! " so cried an airy tongue 
To one who, drifting down Calabria's shore, 
Heard the last knell, in starry midnight rung, 
Of the old Oracles, dumb forevermore. 

A low wail ran along the shuddering deep, 

And as, far off, its flaming accents died, 
The awe-struck sailors, startled from their sleep, 

Gazed, called aloud : no answering voice replied — 

Nor ever will ; the angry gods have fled, 

Closed are the temples, mute are all the shrines, 

The fires are quenched, Dodona's growth is dead, 
The Sibyl's leaves are scattered to the winds. 

No mystic sentence will they bear again, 

Which, sagely spelled, might ward a nation's doom ; 

But we have left us still some godlike men, 

And some great voices pleading from the tomb. 

If we would heed them, they might save us yet, 
Call up some gleams of manhood in our breasts, 

Truth, valor, justice, teach us to forget 
In a grand cause our selfish interests. 

But we have fallen on evil times indeed, 

"When public faith is but the common shame, 

And private morals held an idiot's creed, 
And old-world honesty an empty name. 



538 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

And lust, and greed, and gain are all our arts ! 

The simple lessons which our fathers taught 
Are scorned and jeered at ; in our sordid marts 

We sell the faith for which they toiled and fought. 

Each jostling each in the mad strife for gold, 
The weaker trampled by the unrecking throng ; 

Friends, honor, country, lost, betrayed or sold, 
And lying blasphemies on every tongue. 

Cant for religion, sounding words for truth ; 

Fraud leads to fortune, gelt for guilt atones ; 
No care for hoary age or tender youth, 

For widows' tears or helpless orphans 1 groans. 

The people rage, and work their own wild will ; 

They stone the prophets, drag their highest down, 
And as they smite, with savage folly still 

Smile at their work — those dead eyes wear no frown. 

The sage of " Drainfield" * tills a barren soil, 
And reaps no harvest where he sowed the seed ; 

He has but exile for long years of toil, 

Nor voice in council, though his children bleed. 

And nevermore shall " Kedcliff 's " f oaks rejoice, 
Now bowed with grief above their master's bier ; 

Faction and party stilled that mighty voice, 

Which yet could teach us wisdom, could we hear. 

And " Woodland's " X harp is mute ; the gray old man 
Broods by his lonely hearth and weaves no song ; 

Or, if he sing, the note is sad and wan, 
Like the pale face of one who's suffered long. 

So all earth's teachers have been overborne 

By the coarse crowd, and fainting droop or die ; 

They bear the cross, their bleeding brows the thorn, 
And ever hear the clamor, " Crucify ! " 

* The country-seat of R. Barnwell Rhett. 
•f- The homestead of James H. Hammond. 
X The homestead of W. Gil more Simms (destroyed by Sherman's army). 



0, TE3IP0RA! 0, MORES! 539 

Oh, for a man with godlike heart and brain ! 

A god in stature, with a god's great will, 
And fitted to the time, that not in vain 

Be all the blood we've spilt and yet must spill. 

O brothers ! friends ! shake off the Circean spell ! 

Eouse to the dangers of impending fate ! 
Grasp your keen swords, and all may yet be well — 

More gain, more pelf, and it will be too late ! 
1864. 



A KHYME OF MODERN VENICE.* 

BY CHARLES PATTON DIMITRY. 

" Haste ! open the lattice, Giulia, 

And wheel me my chair, where the sun 
May fall on my face as I welcome 
The sound of the life-giving gun. 
So young when the Corsican sold us ! 
So old when our armies repay ! 
Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! 

" Alas for these years and this weakness 
That shackle me here in my chair, 
While the people's loud vivas are rending 

The chains that once made their despair ! 
The Austrian leaves with the morning, 
And Yenice hath Freedom to-day. 
Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! 

" Ah, would that I only were younger, 
To stand with the rest on the street, 
To toss up my cap on the mola, 

And the tri-color banner to greet ! 
The gondolas, girl, they are passing, 
And what do the gondoliers say ? 
' Viva ! Evviva Italia, 
Viva il Re'f 

" What ! Tears in your eyes, my Giulia % 
You weep when your Yenice is free % 
You mourn for your Austrian lover, 
Whose face nevermore shall you see ! 

* "Till 1866 Venice remained Austrian, save for a few hours in the insurrections of 
1848-49 ; but her people never acknowledged the rights of those who had bought and 
sold them like a flock of sheep. The war between Austria and the allied Prussians and 
Italians in 1866 gave Venice her freedom, and the Unity of Italy was at length accom- 
plished under the sceptre of the house of Savoy ."— Encyclopedia Britannica. 



A RHYME OF MODERN VENICE. 541 

Kneel, girl, kneel beside me and whisper, 
While to Heaven for triumph you pray, 
' Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! ' 

" Ah, shame on the weakness that held you, 
And shame on the heart that was won ! 
"No blood of the gonfaloniere 

Shall mingle with blood of the Hun ! 
Rebuke to the name of the spoiler, 
Swear fealty to Venice and say, 
' Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! ' 

" Bring, girl, from the dust of your closet 
The sword that your ancestor bore, 
When, tamed the hot onset of Genoa, 

Her galleys beat back from our shore. 
great Contarini, your ashes 
To freedom are given to-day ! 
Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! 

" Not these were the cries when our fathers 
The gonfalon gave to the breeze, 
When doges sate solemn in council, 

And Yenice was Queen of the seas, 
But the years of the future are ours 
To humble the pride of the gray — 
Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! 

" Hark ! heard you the gun at the mola, 
And hear you the answering cheer ? 
Our army is coming, Giulia, 

The friends of our Venice are near ! 
Ring out from your old Campanile, 
Freed bells of San Marco to-day, 
' Viva ! Evviva Italia ! 
Viva il Re ! ' " 



THE BACKWOODSMAN'S DAUGHTER. 



BY MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. 

[Mary Ashley (Van Voorhis) Townsend, whose early writings were published 
under the nom de guerre of Xariffa, was born in Lyons, N. Y. Since her marriage, in 
1856, to Mr. Gideon Townsend of New Orleans, she has resided in that city. Mr. Henry 
Austin says : "Though born in the North, Mrs. Townsend is essentially Southern in 
her style, which is more than tropical — possessing a semi-Oriental suggestiveness that 
sometimes luxuriates to a fault — a charming fault, however, in the main. This poet, 
I think, has written finer passages than any American woman, except, perhaps, Emma 
Lazarus and Sarah Helen Whitman ; but the fact that her graceful and vigorous lines 
have been cast in the pleasant places, south of Mason and Dixon line, has been hith- 
erto a bar to that broadness of recognition which she most certainly deserves." Her 
publications include Brother Clerks: a Tale of New Orleans (1859); Poems (1870); 
The Captains Story (1874) ; and Down the Bayou, and other Poems (1882).] 

I was a wanderer from my place of birth, 
Seeking among the wide world's bnsy throng 
A peaceful harbor for my woe-wrecked heart. 
The charm of home was gone — the links of love, 
So blessed in their brightness, broken were, 
And I had turned away, striving to heap 
Upon the black grave of the past the dust 
Of dim forgetf ulness. 

Toward the West 
I turned my troubled brow. I had heard much 
Of that fair land, where the untrammelled herd 
The echoing turf salutes with scornful hoof ; 
Where verdant plains lie like unfolded scrolls 
Whose emerald pages Nature paints with flowers ; 
Where the proud stag beside his timid mate 
Drinks from undesecrated streams ; and all 
Seems like the Eden Garden ere the stain 
Of sin besmeared its beauty. There I turned, 
Not with the hope to find my joys again, 
But with intent my misery to hide 
Out of men's sight forever. 



THE BACKWOODSMAN'S DAUGHTER. 543 

In the car 
Which bore me on — whither I cared nor knew, 
So it was westward and away — I marked 
Among the travellers a swarthy pair — 
A woodman and his wife. Between them sat 
A child — a little girl — whose deep blue eyes, 
Beneath their golden lashes hiding, looked 
Like twin forget-me-nots by sunbeams kissed. 
About her pretty brow and shoulders bare, 
Her yellow locks, not curled nor braided, hung 
In glittering ripples to her slender waist. 
So wonderfully fair she looked beside 
Her rough protectors in her fragile grace, 
She seemed like some frail wind-flower peeping out 
From the broad shadow of two gnarled old oaks. 



Her lips, steeped in their early innocence 

Like morning buds in dew, parted at last, 

And her few words tripped lightly over them 

Like footsteps over flowers. " Father dear," 

She softly said, and twined her little hand 

Amongst the old man's gray and stubborn locks- 

" Dear father, tell me, are we almost home % 

I am so weary of this clattering car, 

This dust and din, and all this careless crowd 

Of people whom I never saw before. 

Tell me, dear father, are we almost home ? " 



" 'Most home ! " the sire returned, and laid his hand 
Upon her upturned brow ; " and why, my child, 
Dost long to reach that spot which ill compares 
With those fair city scenes whence you have come I 
Dost thou forget the rich man's splendid home, 
The busy streets with all their glittering crowds, 
The gay shop- windows where each day you saw 
So many tempting toys and wondrous books ? 
And dost remember how you loved to hear 
The chiming church-bells in the steeples high, 
And often drew your little hand from mine 
To climb the steps, and through the doorways vast 
Catch glimpses of rieligion's love of show ? " 



544 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

" True, father dear," the little one replied — 
" True, I did like the busy city crowds, 
The lofty houses where rich people dwell, 
The gay shop-windows and the pretty toys, 
Because they were so wonderful and new 
To my unpractised eyes. In vestibules 
Of solemn churches, too, I loved to wait 
To hear the wings of music beat the air 
When the deep organ did the Sabbath greet. 
I well remember how I drew away 
My humble garments, lest they might defile 
The dazzling robes of those who could afford 
In worthier garb to worship. Yet I knew 
The heart lies naked in our Father's sight, 
Howe'er the form is clad ; and I was sure 
That he could see my fervent love for Him 
Beneath my simple gown. I envied none 
Their wealth, nor did I wonder that they wore 
Their best in presence of their King." 

" My child," 
The father said, while to his rugged face 
A smile came tenderly, " thy words are good ; 
But bear in mind that in thy Western home 
All this which thou dost own to having loved 
Will to thy beauty-loving eyes be lost ; 
Such things belong not, darling, to the poor." 

" The poor have memories just like the rich," 
She gently said. " I can remember all, 
And make my mind a picture-book to read 
To little friends who have not seen as much." 

Into the father's eye leaped a swift tear 

And trembled there, while with unsteady lip 

His questions still he plied : " But tell me why 

Thy little heart hath fixed itself, my child, 

So fondly on our lowly wild wood cot ? 

There trials are, and hardships chain the hands 

Of those who love thee, and exacting toil 

Doth from affection steal her sweetest hours. 

How can that spot be brighter in thy sight 

Than homes where ease presides and care is not ? " 



THE BACKWOODSMAN'S DAUGHTER. 545 

Upon the woodman's wrinkled face the child 
Fixed her blue eyes in wonder at his words ; 
And then, as if her little lips returned 
The all-sufficient answer, she replied, 
" Why, father, that is home ! " 

m, ,, . . The shining tear 

lhat had been trembling in the old man's eye 
Fell, at her words, down o'er his swarthy cheek 
And with a quick embrace of thankfulness 
He clasped his darling to his rough, broad breast, 
Praising the Father that his child possessed 
That best of blessings— a contented heart. 

She, smiling there within his loving arms, 
Eecalled to him that little spot outWest,' 
Where, in the sunny forest-clearing stood 
• Their lowly rough-hewn cabin, where each morn 
The merry brook ran laughing past the door, 
As if its freight were joy to all the world 
" There," murmured she, half dreaming in his arms, 

Ihe livelong day among the woody wilds 
I find such pretty playmates and playthings. 
The velvet-footed rabbit waits for me 
Beneath the sheltering cover of the fern • 
The squirrel, chattering o'er his nutty meal, 
Flies not at my approach ; and pretty stones 
With fallen acorns, fill my lap with toys. 
The cool moss seems to welcome my bare feet, 
And birds recite their poetry to me 
As perfectly as though I were a queen, 
And never ask if I be rich or poor ! " 

Across her hair, while thus she prattled on, 
The slanting sunbeams gently stretched themselves, 
I hen stole away like worshippers content 
With having touched some consecrated thing. 
Before the day was wholly gone, the train 
Stopped at a backwoods station, and the child, 
Holding the hands of those whose prize she w'as, 
Passed from my sight forever. She was home. ' 
35 



546 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

Long did I muse upon the simple scene ; 

And like a sharp rebuke the child's sweet words 

Sank in my restless heart. She, with a cot, 

A few wild flowers and unfettered pets, 

Was rich ; whilst I, with all that wealth could give, 

A glittering home and hosts of titled friends, 

Lashed to the demon Discontent, was out 

Upon the world a wanderer ! 

Long years 
Have sped since then ; but in my dreams by night 
And in my walks by day, by that child's voice 
I feel my sad heart haunted. Echoing there, 
It hath for me a strange significance. 
Out of the blazing blue of noonday skies, 
And up beyond the midnight's starry depths, 
It seems to gently lead my chastened soul, 
And leave it trembling by mysterious gates, 
While its soft echoes whisper, " That is home ! " 

1870. 



CKEED. 

BY MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. 
I. 

I believe if I should die, 
And you should kiss my eyelids when I lie 

Cold, dead, and dumb to all the world contains, 
The folded orbs would open at thy breath, 
And from its exile in the isles of death 

Life would come gladly back along my veins ! 

ii. 

I believe if I were dead, 
And you upon my lifeless heart should tread, 

Not knowing what the poor clod chanced to be, 
It would find sudden pulse beneath the touch 
Of him it ever loved in life so much, 

And throb again, warm, tender, true to thee. 

in. 

I believe if on my grave, 
Hidden in woody deeps or by the wave, 

Your eyes should drop some warm tears of regret, 
From every salty seed of your dear grief, 
Some fair, sweet blossom would leap into leaf, 

To prove death could not make my love forget. 



I believe if I should fade 
Into those mystic realms where light is made, 

And you should long once more my face to see, 
I would come forth upon the hills of night 
And gather stars, like fagots, till thy sight, 

Led by their beacon blaze, fell full on me. 



I believe my faith in thee, 
Strong as my life, so nobly placed to be, 



548 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

I would as soon expect to see the sun 
Fall like a dead king from his height sublime, 
His glory stricken from the throne of time, 

As thee un worth the worship thou hast won. 

VI. 

I believe who hath not loved 
Hath half the sweetness of his life unproved ; 

Like one who, with the grape within his grasp, 
Drops it with all its crimson juice unpressed, 
And all its luscious sweetness left unguessed, 

Out from his careless and unheeding clasp. 

VII. 

I believe love, pure and true, 
is to the soul a sweet, immortal dew 

That gems life's petals in its hours of dusk. 
The waiting angels see and recognize 
The rich crown jewel, love, of paradise, 

When life falls from us like a withered husk. 

1870. 



TO ONE BELOVED. 



BY MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. 



I know, to-night, thou art among the gay, 
The centre of a light and joyous throng, 
Who hang upon thy laugh, thy jest, thy song ; 
I know the dawn will gather, cold and gray, 
And find me waiting thee till break of day. 
Our lives together have known no alloy, 
And, dearest, thy delight is mine alway. 

Though thou art absent I am with thee now ; 
Thought, like some stalwart swimmer, parts the waves, 
And, eager for the resting-place he craves, 

Leaps, nude and glowing, from the amber tide 
Of Memory, and, rushing to thy arms, 
His dripping limbs in thy caresses warms. 
1870. 



LAKE PONTCHARTRAIK 

BY MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. 

Into thy sapphire wave, fair Pontchartrain, 
Slow sinks the setting sun ; the distant sail, 
On far horizon's edge, glides hushed and pale, 

Like some escaping spirit o'er the main. 

The sea-gull soars, then tastes thy wave again ; 
The bearded forests on thy sandy shore 
In silence stand, e'en as they stood of yore 

While yet the red man held his savage reign, 

And daring Iberville's adventurous prow 
As yet had never cut thy purple wave, 

ISTor swung the shadow of his shining sail 
Across the bark of the Biloxi brave. 

Ah, placid lake ! where are thy warriors now % 
Where their abiding-places — where their grave ? 
1870. 



THE PICTURE. 

BY WILLIAM H. HOLCOMBE. 

I saw a lovely picture 

In a gallery of art, 
"Which charmed me like an April rose, 

And I wear it in my heart ; 
Not like the rose of gardens, 

Which withers soon away, 
But planted in my heart of hearts, 

It never shall decay. 

It was a blooming maiden, 

So beautiful and pure, 
'Twas mirrored from an angel's face 

In a vision, I am sure. 
A dove of heavenly plumage 

Upon her bosom lay ; 
I saw the spirit of the dove 

Around her lips at play. 

I longed to see the painter, 

I longed to grasp his hand ; 
I know there is a common ground 

Whereon we two could stand. 
I know he has been happy. 

And his heart is full of love, 
Or he never could have imaged forth 

That maiden and her dove. 

For as the dove resembles 

The virgin's spotless thought, 
So is this picture like the soul 

From which it was outwrought ; 
And of that glorious spirit 

I catch a radiant part, 
Which I have called a rose, and plant 

Forever in my heart. 



PERE DAGOBERT* 



BY M. E. M. DAVIS. 



None of your meagre, fasting, wild-eyed, spare, 

Old friars was Father Dagobert ! 

He paced the streets of the vieux ca/rre 

In seventeen hundred and somewhat, gay, 

Rubicund, jovial, round, and fat. 

He wore a worldly three-cornered hat 

On his shaven pate ; he had silken hose 

To his ample legs ; and he tickled his nose 

"With snuff from a gold taoatiere. 

He listened with courtly, high-bred air 

To the soft-eyed penitente who came — 

Kirtled lassie or powdered dame — 

To kneel by the carved confessional, 

And breathe in a whisper musical 

The deadliest sins she could recall. 

La Nouvelle Orleans' self was young, 

"When the Pere came over from France, a strong, 

Handsome, rollicking Capuchin brother, 

Poor as a mouse of the Church, his mother, 

With a voice like an angel's, sweet and clear, 

That saints and sinners rejoiced to hear. 

The town it had grown apace, and he 

For the goodly half of the century 

Had blessed its brides when the banns were said, 

And christened its babies, and buried its dead ; 

He had sipped the wines from its finest stores 

As he played at chess with its Governors ; 

And wherever a feast was forward, there 

"Was a cover for Father Dagobert. 

* [From Harper's Magazine. Copyright, 1888, by Harper & Brothers.] 



PERE DAGOBERT. 553 

In the midst of its fields of indigo 
Where the sleek black negroes, row on row, 
Dug and delved for the brotherhood, 
The stately house of the Order stood ; 
And here at ease on their fine estate 
The Pere and his Capuchins slept and ate 
And thrived and fattened for many a year, 
Ungrudged by none of their royal cheer. 



11. 

But over the wall of this paradise 

One day the inquisitorial eyes 

Of the Spanish Padre Cirilo 

Gazed, horror-stricken ! 

" Your Grace must know," 

He wrote with haste to the Order's head, 

" What shame by our Order here is spread ; 
An idle, battening set, they dwell — 
Unmindful each of his cord and cell- 
In a galleried convent, tall and fair, 
Misgoverned by one named Dagobert 
(A bibulous Frenchman, gross and fat, 
Who wears a graceless three-cornered hat, 
And takes his snuff from a jewelled box). 
They have cunningly carven singing clocks 
In their refectory ; when they dine 
They drink the best and the beadiest wine ; 
They have silver spoons and forks — nay, more, 
They have special spoons for the cafe noir 
That clears their brains when the feast is o'er. 

" This Dagobert " (so the Padre said) 

" Usurps the power of the Church's Head, 

And cares not a fig what Rome has wrought I 

The Santa Cruzada itself is naught ; 

And thirty years it hath been, in full, 

Since Papal or Apostolic Bull 

Hath reached his flock ; but the people fare 

Content to follow the singing Pere ; 

For in truth he sings, and sings, alas ! 

With a seraph's tongue at the daily mass." 



554 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

Further he told how this singing priest 

Forgot the fast and shifted the feast 

Of the Holy Church at his own good will, 

"With the people blindly following still. 

He hinted at comely quadroons a-stare 

With bold black eyes at morning prayer 

In the convent chapel, or strolling, gay, 

Through the convent halls at close of day. 

" And the rascals grow daily richer ! Your Grace " 

(He groaned) " must look to this godless place, 

And humble the head of this haughty friar ! " 

His Grace was shocked. With a holy ire 

He sped his edict across the sea. 

But a wrathful Province heard the decree, 

And Governor, Alcalde, citizen staid, 

Riffraff, soldier, matron, and maid, 

All swore nor Church, nor State should dare 

To rob them of Father Dagobert ! 

So back to Spain the Padre went, 

Humbled himself, and penitent. 

The Pere, unruffled, pursued his way, 

Disturbed nor vexed to his dying day ; 

And the friars rejoiced to their convent's core, 

And slept and ate at their ease once more. 

in. 

Down in the weed-grown Cimetiere 

St. Louis reposes the worthy Pere ; 

And they say, when the nights are warm and sweet, 

And stayed is the sound of passing feet, 

That he clambers down from his snug retreat 

In the crumbling vault, and up and down 

The narrow walks, in his fine serge gown 

And three-cornered hat, he makes his way, 

And sings as he goes till the break of day ; 

And the powdered dames of the old regime, 

And the pig-tail courtiers, all agleam 

With jewels and orders, come thronging out 

From tombs and vaults — a shadowy rout — 

To sit atop of the mouldy stones 

That cover the common plebeian bones, 



PERE DAGOBERT. 555 

And listen, all wrapped in a vapory mist ; 

While the hands they have pressed, the lips they have kissed, 

In the olden days, grow warm again, 

And the eyes whereon rusty coins have lain 

For a hundred years and more grow bright 

With the deathless joys of a long-gone night. 

— A bell in Don Almonaster's tower 
By the old Place d'Armes rings out the hour. 
Short in his canticle stops the Pere 
To cross himself and mutter a prayer ; 
Then he climbs to his chilly resting-place 
And pulls his cope up over his face, 
And folds his hands in a patient way, 
And rests himself through the livelong day. 

The dames and courtiers slowly rise, 
Brushing the dews from their softened eyes, 
And courtesying grandly as they go, 
They pass along in a stately row ; 
They pause at the doors of their family tombs- 
Glancing askance at the inner glooms, 
And lifting a finger with slow demur- 
To say with that air of a cojinoisseur 
That greeted a Manon, when she and they 
Trod the stage of the vieux carre, 
" Mafoi ! 'tis a wondrous tiling and rare, 
The singing of Father Dagobert ! " 



THROWING THE WANGA.* 

(st. john's eve.) 

BY M. E. M. DAVIS. 

Shrill over dark blue Pontchartrain 
It comes and goes, the weird refrain, 
Wanga ! wanga ! 

The trackless swamp is quick with cries 
Of noisome things that dip and rise 
On night-grown wings ; and in the deep 
Bark pools the monstrous forms that sleep 
Inert by day uplift their heads. 
The zelafloioer its poison sheds 
Upon the warm and languorous air ; 
The lak-vine weaves its noxious snare ; 
The wide palmetto leaves are stirred 
By venomed breathings, faintly heard 
Across the still, star-lighted night. 

Her lonely spice-fed fire, alight 
Upon the black swamfs utmost rim, 
Now spreads and fares, now smoidders dim; 
And at her feet they curl and break, 
The dark blue waters of the lake. 

Her arms are wild above her head — 
Old withered arms, whose charm has fled. 

Zizi, Creole Zizi, 
You is slim an' straight ez a saplin' 

Dat grows by de bayou's aiclge ; 
You is brown an' sleek ez a young Bob White 

Whar hides in de yaller sedge. 

Yo' eyes is black an' shiny, 
An' quick ez de lightnin' flash ; 
* [From Harper's Weekly. Copyright, 1889, by Harper & Brothers.] 



THROWING THE WANG A. 557 

You wuz bawn in de time er freedom, 
An' never is felt de lash. 
— Me, I kin th'ow wanga ! 

Her dusky face is wracked and seamed, 
That once like ebon marble gleamed. 

Tata, Creole Zizi, 
You is spry on yo' foot ez de jay-bird 

"Whar totes de debble his san' ; 
You kin tole de buckra to yo' side 

By de turnin' o' yo' han'. 

Yo' ways is sweet ez de sugar 

You puts in yo' pralines, 
"When de orange flower on de banquette draps, 

An' de pistache-nut is green. 
— Me, I kin th'ow wanga ! 

Her knotted shoulders, broion and bare, 
The deathless scars of slave hood wear. 

Tata, Creole Zizi, 
You is crope lak a thieft to de do'-yard 

When de moon wuz shinin' high, 
An' you stole de ole man' heart erway 

Wid de laughin' in yo' eye. 

My ole man ! — de chillun's daddy ! 

"We is hoed de cotton row 
An' shucked de corn-shuck side by side 

Fer forty year an' mo' ! 
— Me, I kin th'ow wanga ! 

The flames that leap about her feet 
Burn with a perfume strange and sweet. 

Tata, Creole Zizi, 
Twis' yo'se'f in de coonjine 

Lak a moccason in de slime ; 
Twis' yo'se'f when de fiddle talks 

Fer de las' endurin' time. 



558 POETRY— MISCELLANEOUS. 

Den was'e ter de bone in de midnight, 

In de mawnin' was'e erway ; 
Bu'n wid heat in de winter-time, 

An' shiver de hottes' day — 
Wanga ! wanga ! 

Onder yo' fla'ntin' tignon 

De red-hot beetles crawl, 
Wid claws dat sco'ch inter de meat, 

An' mek de blood-draps fall ! 

Over yo' bed de screech-owl 

In de midnight screech an' cry ! 
Den kiver yo' head, Creole Zizi — 

Den kiver yo' head an' die — 
Wanga! wanga! 

Her voice is hushed, she crouches low 

Above the embers' 1 flickering glow. 

The sivamp-wind wakes, and many a thing 

Unnamed flits by on furry wing y 

They brush her cheeks unfelt y she hears 

The far-off songs of other years. 

Her eyes grow tender as she sways 
And croons above the dying blaze. 

mm 
Oh, de cabin at de quarter in de old plantation days, 

Wid de garden patch behin' it an' de gode-vine by de do', 
An' de do'-yard sot wid roses, where de chillun runs and plays, 

An' de streak o' sunshine, yaller lak, er-slantin' on de flo' ! 

We wuz young an' lakly niggers when de ole man fotch me home. 

Ole Mis' she gin de weddin', an' young Mis' she dress de bride ! 
He say he gvrineter love me twel de time o' kingdom come, 

An' forty year an' uperds we is trabble side by side ! 

But ole Mars' wuz killed at Shiloh, an' young Mars' at Wilderness ; 

Ole Mis' is in de graveyard, wid young Mis' by her side, 
An' all er we-all's fambly is scattered eas' an' wes', 

An' de gode-vine by de cabin do' an' de roses all has died ! 



THROWING THE WANGA. 559 



My chillun dey is scattered, too, can' some is onder groun'. 

Hit wuz forty year an' uperds we is trabble, him an' me 
Ole Mis', whar is de glory o' de freedom I is foun' ? 

De ole man he is lef me fer de young eyes o' Zizi ! 

Her arms are wild above her head, 
The softness from her voice has fed. 

Tata, Creole Zizi, 
Twis' yo'se'f in de coonjine 

Lak a moccason in de slime ; 
Kunjur de ole man wid yo' eye 

Fer de las' endurin' time ! 

Den cry an' mo'n in de mawnin', 

In de midnight mo'n an' cry, 
Twel de debble has you, han' an' foot, 

Den stretch yo'se'f an' die ! — 
Wanga ! wanga ! 



MY LOVE WENT SAILING O'ER THE SEA. 

BY M. E. M. DAVIS. 

My Love went sailing o'er the sea, 
And gold and gems he promised me, 
But one white shell he had from me. 

A sailor-lad my Love was he, 

But " Captain yet, my lass, I'll be ! " 

He cried with that last kiss to me. 

I watched the ships sail in from sea, 
"With white sails spreading wide and free, 
And sailors chanting merrily. 

And Captains tall and fair to see 
Stood on their decks ; but none to me 
Held out the hand or bent the knee. 

At last a ship crawled in from sea, 
Crippled, and stained, and old was she, 
And over her side my Love stepped he, 

And down at my feet he bent his knee ; 
" A sailor still, my girl ! " cried he, 
" And one white shell I bring to iheeP 



SILENCE. 



BY M. E. M. DAVIS. 



This is not silence, love ! 
For though the wind doth faint and fail outside, 

Though in the gathered dusk all sound doth die, 
Yet on thy perfect face, oh, true and tried, 

Uplift to mine, a spell-like light doth lie, 
That fills the air with language sweeter far 

Than any living sound ! There is no call 
Eor words ! There needs no light of moon or star— 

'Twixt me and thee the darkness cannot fall, 
Nor any silence, love ! 

Ah, this is silence, love ! 
A thousand clamorous sounds are in the air, 

The busy throngs go up and down the street ; 
But ah, these pallid roses in thy hair, mm 

These hands across thy bosom fixed and sweet ! 
The cold white lids upon thine eyes, to be 

Uplifted nevermore ! The spell-like light 
No more to gather, love, 'twixt me and thee ! 

This is a darkness deeper far than night, 
And this is silence, love ! 



COUNSEL. 



BY M. E. M. DAVIS. 



If thou shouldst bid thy friend farewell — 

But for one night though that farewell should be- 
Press thou his hand in thine ; how canst thou tell 
How far from thee 



Fate or caprice may lead his feet, 

Ere that to-morrow come ? Men have been known 
Lightly to turn the corner of a street, 
And days have grown 

To months, and months to lagging years, 

Before they looked in loving eyes again. 
Parting, at best, is underlaid with tears — 
With tears and pain. 

Therefore, lest sudden death should come between, 

Or time, or distance, clasp with pressure true 
The palm of him who goeth forth. Unseen 
Fate goeth too ! 

Yea, find thou alway time to say 

Some earnest word betwixt the idle talk, 
Lest with thee henceforth, night and day, 
Regret should walk. 

The Galaxy, 1872. 



FOR THEE, MY LOVE, FOR TFIEE. 

BY MARK F. BIGNEY. 

[Mark Frederick Bigney was horn in Nova Scotia in 1817. Coming to New 
Orleans about 1847, he was successively connected, as writer, with the Delta, the True 
Delia, the Mirror, a literary weekly, and the Picayune, finally becoming, in 1865, 
managing editor of the New Orleans Times. In 1867 he was one of the founders of 
the New Orleans City Item, of which he was the leading editor at the time of his death 
in 1886. As a journalist, he was cautious in forming an opinion, but bold in maintain- 
ing it. His only published volume is Poems (1867).] 

Thy love's the sun, thou peerless one — 

It warms me with its glow ; 
With light divine it seems to shine, 

Though I alone can know 
Its secret charm, a shield from harm 

On life's uncertain sea. 
Oh, I shall pray, both night and day, 

For thee, my love, for thee ! 

With starry gleams, in holy dreams 

Thou comest to my soul, 
As o'er a strand of golden sand 

Life's sparkling waters roll ; 
And, with the kiss of purest bliss, 

Attuned to harmony, 
My thoughts arise to brightest skies, 

With thee, my love, with thee. 

The golden chimes of sweetest rhymes 

Thy charms but faintly tell ; 
The softest note that e'er did float 

From fairy horn or shell, 
With birds that sing and floAvers of spring, 

And all bright things that be, 
None can compare, with voice or air, 

With thee, my love, with thee. 



564 



POETR Y-MISCELLANEOUS. 

Oh, I would write thy name with light 

To shame the stars above, 
And in high lays would ever praise 

The riches of thy love ! 
AH wealth that shines in golden mines 

All gems of land and sea, 
Are but as rust and trampled dust, 

To thee, my love, to thee. 






I'VE KISSED HER IN A DREAM. 

BY MARK F. BIGNEY. 

She moves along the crowded streets, 

A vision fair and bright ; 
Her lustrous eyes outshine the stars 

Which gem the halls of Night. 
Her lips are Love's delighted throne, 

Her cheeks twin roses seem ; 
And oh, the bliss — the more than bliss — 

I've kissed her in a dream ! 

Her voice is music, and her step 

Is light as zephyr's tread ; 
'Tis paradise where'er she is ; 

"Tis rapture to be led 
By her soft hand through phantom-lands, 

Where love is all the theme ; 
And oh, the bliss — the more than bliss — 

I've kissed her in a dream ! 

Let others praise their work-day loves, 

And pledge them in their wine, 
Thought-blossoms, culled in fairy groves, 

I'll wreath in song for mine. 
She's fair as heaven, and dear and pure 

As sunlight's primal beam ; 
And oh, the bliss — the more than bliss — 

I've kissed her in a dream ! 



HAGAR 

BY ELIZA J. NICHOLSON. 

[Eliza Jane (Poitevent) Nicholson — well known under the nom-de-plume of 
"Pearl Rivers" — is the joint owner, with her husband, Mr. George Nicholson, of the 
New Orleans Picayune. Her only published volume is Lyrics (1873). One of her critics 
says : " She is one of Nature's sweetest poets, and as pure-hearted as the blue river from 
which she takes her name— a wild- wood warbler, knowing how to sing of birds and flowers 
and flowing brooks, and all things beautiful."] 

Go back ! How dare you follow me beyond 

The door of my poor tent ? Are you afraid 

That I have stolen something % See ! my hands 

Are empty, like my heart. I am no thief ! 

The bracelets and the golden finger rings 

And silver anklets that you gave to me, 

I cast upon the mat before my door, 

And trod upon them. I would scorn to take 

One trinket with me in my banishment 

That would recall a look or tone of yours, 

My lord, my generous lord, who send me forth, 

A loving woman, with a loaf of bread 

And jug of water on my shoulder laid, 

To thirst and hunger in the wilderness ! 

Go back ! 
Go back to Sara ! See, she stands 
"Watching us there, behind the flowering date, 
With jealous eyes, lest my poor hands should steal 
One farewell touch from yours. Go back to her, 
And say that Hagar has a heart as proud, 
If not so cold, as hers ; and, though it break, 
It breaks without the sound of sobs, without 
The balm of tears to ease its pain. It breaks, 
It breaks, my lord, like iron — hard, but clean — 
And breaking asks no pity. If my lips 
Should let one plea for mercy slip between 
These words that lash you with a woman's scorn, 
My teeth should bite them off, and I would spit 
Them at you, laughing, though all red and warm with blood. 



HAGAR. 567 

" Cease ! " do you say '. Xo, by the gods 
Of Egypt, I do swear that if my eyes 
Should let one tear melt through their burning lids, 
My hands should pluck them out ; and if these hands, 
Groping outstretched in blindness, should by chance 
Touch yours, and cling to them against my will, 
My Ishmael should cut them off, and blind 
And maimed, my little son should lead me forth 
Into the wilderness to die. Go back ! 
Does Sara love you as I did, my lord ? 
Does Sara clasp and kiss your feet, and bend 
Her haughty head in worship at your knee ? 
Ah, Abraham, you were a god to me ! 
If you but touched my hand my foolish heart 
Ean down into the palm, and throbbed and thrilled, 
Grew hot and cold, and trembled there ; and when 
You spoke, though not to me, my heart ran out 
To listen through my eager ears and catch 
The music of your voice and prison it 
In memory's murmuring shell. I saw no fault 
Nor blemish in yon, and your flesh to me 
Was dearer than my own. There is no vein 
That branches from your heart, whose azure course 
I have not followed with my kissing lips. 
I would have bared my bosom like a shield 
To any lance of pain that sought your breast. 
And once, when you lay ill within your tent, 
~No taste of water or of bread or wine 
Passed through my lips ; and all night long I lay 
Upon the mat before your door to catch 
The sound of your dear voice, and scarcely dared 
To breathe, lest she, my mistress, should come forth 
And drive me angrily away ; and when 
The stars looked down with eyes that only stared 
And hurt me with their lack of sympathy, 
Weeping, I threw my longing arms around 
Benammi's neck. Your good horse understood 
And gently rubbed his face against my head, 
To comfort me. But if you had one kind, 
One loving thought of me in all that time, 
That long, heart-breaking time, you kept it shut 
Close in your bosom as a tender bud, 
And did not let it blossom into words. 



568 POETR Y—MISCELLANEO US. 

Your tenderness was all for Sara. Through 

The door, kept shut against my love, there came 

No message to poor Hagar, almost crazed 

With grief lest you should die. Ah ! you have been 

So cruel and so cold to me, my lord ; 

And now you send me forth with Ishmael, 

Not on a journey through a pleasant land 

Upon a camel as my mistress rides, 

With kisses, and sweet words, and dates and wine, 

But cast me off, and sternly send me forth 

Into the wilderness with these poor gifts — 

A jug of water and — a loaf of bread. 

That sound was not a sob ; I only lost 

My breath and caught it hard again. Go back ! 

Why do you follow me ? I am a poor 

Bondswoman, but a woman still, and these 

Sad memories, so bitter and so sweet, 

Weigh heavily upon my breaking heart 

And make it hard, my lord, for me to go. 

" Your God commands it ? " Then my gods, the gods 

Of Egypt, are more merciful than yours. 

Isis and good Osiris never gave 

Command like this, that breaks a woman's heart, 

To any prince in Egypt. Come with me, 

And let us go and worship them, dear lord. 



Leave all your wealth to Sara. Sara loves 

The touch of costly linen and the scent 

Of precious Chaldean spices, and to bind 

Her brow with golden fillets, and perfume 

Her hair with ointment. Sara loves the sound 

Of many cattle lowing on the hills ; 

And Sara loves the slow and stealthy tread 

Of many camels moving on the plains. 

Hagar loves you. Oh, come with me, dear lord ! 

Take but your staff and come with me ! Your mouth 

Shall drink my share of water from this jug 

And eat my share of bread with Ishmael ; 

And from your lips I will refresh myself 

With love's sweet wine from tender kisses pressed. 

Ah, come, dear lord ! Oh, come, my Abraham ! 

Nay, do not bend your cold, stern brows on me 



HAGAR. 569 

So frowningly ; it was not Hagar's voice 
That spoke those pleading words. 

Go back ! Go back ! 
And tell your God I hate him, and I hate 
The cruel, craven heart that worships him 
And dares not disobey. Ha ! I believe 
'Tis not your far-off, bloodless God you fear, 
But Sara. Coward ! Cease to follow me ! 
Go back to Sara. See ! she beckons now. 
Hagar loves not a coward ; you do well 
To send me forth into the wilderness, 
Where hatred hath no weapon keen enough 
That held within a woman's slender hand 
Could stab a coward to the heart. 

I go! 
I go, my lord ; proud that I take with me, 
Of all your countless herds by Hebron's brook, 
Of all your Canaan riches, naught but this — 
A jug of water and a loaf of bread. 
And now, by all of Egypt's gods, I swear, 
If it were not for Ishmael's dear sake, 
My feet would tread upon this bitter bread, 
My hands would pour this water on the sands, 
And leave this jug as empty as my heart 
Is empty now of all the reverence 
And overflowing love it held for you. 

I go! 
But I will teach my little Ishmael 
To hate his father for his mother's sake. 
His bow shall be the truest bow that flies 
Its arrows through the desert air ; his feet 
The fleetest on the desert's burning sands. 
Ay ! Hagar's son a desert prince shall be, 
"Whose hand shall be against all other men ; 
And he shall rule a fierce and mighty tribe, 
Whose fiery hearts and supple limbs will scorn 
The chafing curb of bondage, like the fleet 
Wild horses of Arabia. 

I go! 
But like this loaf that you have given me, 
So shall your bread taste bitter with my hate ; 
And like the water in this jug, my lord, 
So shall the sweetest water that you draw 



570 POETR Y-MISCELLANEO US. 

From Canaan's wells taste salty with my tears. 

Farewell ! I go, but Egypt's mighty gods 

"Will go with me, and my avengers be. 

And in whatever distant land your God, 

Your cruel God of Israel, is known, 

There, too, the wrongs that you have done this day 

To Hagar and your first-born, Ishmael, 

Shall waken and uncoil themselves, and hiss 

Like adders at the name of Abraham. 

Cosmopolitan Magazine,, November, 1893. 



WAITING. 

BY ELIZA J. NICHOLSON. 

Down the golden shores of Sunset, 
On the silver Twilight strand, 

For my dark-eyed poet-lover 
I in dreamy waiting stand. 

O'er the waters deep that part us, 
In the fairy barque of Thought, 

Winged with silken sails from Dreamland, 
By the hand of Fancy wrought, 

He is floating, floating softly, 
Floating straight to love and me. 

Hark ! the mellow, mellow music 
Of his voice upon the sea. 

Keason guides the fairy shallop, 
And his heart-throbs dip it low ; 

With a dreamy, dreamy motion, 
Kock it gently to and fro. 

He has passed the shoals of Pleasure, 
Though the sirens singing there 

Sought to bind him to their bosoms 
With their golden, golden hair. 

And he brings a precious freightage, 

Sparkling gems of Poesie, 
Gathered from the Isles of Beauty, 

And this wealth is all for me ! 

All for me ! his chaste, his chosen, 

Standing by the Sunset-land, 
Like the spirit of a Lily 

On the silver Twilight strand ! 



ONLY A HEAKT. 

BY ELIZA J. NICHOLSON. 

Only a heart — a woman's heart ! 

Step on it, crush it — so ! 
Bravely done, like a man, and true. 

Turn on your heel and go. 

Only a heart ! Do not fear, my lord, 

Nobody on earth is near 
To come to the cry of the wounded thing, 

And God is too far to hear ! 

Only a heart ! What matters it, pray, 

My lord of the iron heel ? 
Crush it again, with a pitiless smile ; 

'Tis weakness, my lord, to feel. 

Nay, stoop not to touch it or soothe it, my lord, 

With the balm of a gentle word. 
So — so— coldly turn from the crushed, bleeding thing ; 

It is only a heart, my lord. 

Only a heart ! What harm is done ? 

Let it bleed in the dust and moan, 
Or stifle its anguish as best it may, 

Or stiffen, my lord, into stone. 

Only a heart ! It was fresh, and young, 

And tender, and warm, I know ; 
As pure as the spirit of chastity, 

My lord — and it loved you so. 

But nothing is lost. Let it die, my lord, 

Let its death be quiet or slow. 
Such hearts are plenty as summer leaves ; 

We find them wherever we go. 



ONLY A HEART. 573 

Only a heart ! and for loving you so, 

The cup that you gave let it drain 
To the bitterest dregs. Let it quiver and bleed. 

Let it beat a full rhythm of pain. 

Nay ! Stay not to make it a grave, my lord ; 

But back to your pleasures depart — 
No blood on your hand, no stain on your soul ; 

It was only a weak woman's heart ! 



DKEAMS OF THE PAST. 



BY R. N. OGDEN. 



[Robert Nash Ogden, a lawyer by profession, was born in Baton Rouge, La., May 
5, 1889. He served with distinction in the Confederate army. Since the reconstruction 
era, he has been prominent in the politics of Louisiana, and especially during Governor 
Wiltz's administration, when he was Speaker of the House of Representatives of the- 
State. He is best known as an orator, but has confined his talents to no one field. He 
devotes much of his leisure to light literature, and has written an interesting novel, 
entitled Who Did It ? (1886). He is, at this writing, one of the Judges of the Court of 
Appeals of New Orleans.] 

Dreams of the past ! 
How vividly you seem 

To crowd upon my aching brain, 
Hacking my memory by thoughts that teem 
AVith fire, anguish, and despair ; 
Tearing aside the veil 
And leaving bare 
The faults of youth, passion, jealousy, and rage, 
That madden even now, in spite of age. 

I see her even yet, 

As on that morn in May. 
(Oh ! would to God I could forget ! ) 

She looked as placid as the day ; 
Her long, soft tresses, waving in the air, 
Clustered like sunshine 
'Round her bosom fair ; 
Which heaved and fell, like the undulating sea. 
As her soft, lustrous eyes did dwell on me. 

Her little hand, so white, 

Gently a bunch of violets held 

(Faded violets, still near my heart you dwell) ; 

And when she oped her lips in love, 

The very angels from above, 

Scenting the violets and her breath, 

Turned from the flowers, and touched her lips by stealth. 



DREAMS OF THE PAST. 575 



So fragrant, sweet, and holy, chaste, 

Sin became virtue by the taste. 

Her soft brown eye, 

Pregnant with the fire 

Of sweet yet pure desire, 

Shone out in spite of her long lashes, 

Twinkling like the brightest star, 

Reflecting heaven from afar ; 

And, ever and anon, the flashes 

Dazzled as I gazed, 

Mute in astonishment and amazed. 



She was my wife ! 
My little wife, whose love to me was constant life 
Whose ev'ry thought was mine alone, 
More happy than the monarch throned ; 
Whose smile, like as the rays of Heaven, 
Dispelling gloom, was ever given. 
Her thoughts were like the purest snow, 
No evil could she ever know ; 
And yet within my heart jealousy began to grow. 

I fancied once (in evil hour) 

My love for her had lost its power ; 

And then the demon of despair, 

Like hungry beast within his lair, 

Taught me to suspect this flower fair, 

This angel bright, this beauty rare ! 

Oh, cursed hour ! oh, miserable man ! 

That she should come to grief, and by thy hand ; 

Weep bitter tears — forget it if you can ! 

I spoke the cruel word. 

Startled and tremblingly she heard, 

And then her eyes flashed with a fire 

So strongly bright, but not with ire ; 

Her low, soft voice was heard — 

Sweet voice, I treasure every word — 

Startling in its grief my ear ; 

One look — so sad of love — one sie'h, 

Great God ! I felt it, then, that she would die. 



576 POETR Y—MISCELLANEO US. 

Dreams of the past ! 
How vividly you seem 

To crowd upon my aching brain, 
Racking my memory by thoughts that teem 
With fire, anguish, and despair ; 
Filling the air 
"With phantoms grim, 
That rise, in spite of penitence and prayer, 
And madly haunt me thus, e'en everywhere. 



THE LIGHT OF THINE EYES. 



BY K. N. OGDEN. 



The light of thine eyes, dear love, 
Sears and scorches my heart, 
As the flash of the lightning burns and blights the life of the tree — 
Then you are angry with me. 

The light of thine eyes, dear love, 
Warms to life the joys of my heart, 
As the rays of the genial sun make fruit of the bloom of the tree — 
Then you are loving to me. 

37 



THE HOUSE IMMORTAL. 



BY RICHARD NIXON. 



[Richard Nixon was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, March 21, 1860. In his child- 
hood his parents brought him with them to their home in New Orleans. In 1884 and 
1885 he was secretary of the two expositions held successively in New Orleans. In 1886 
he took up his residence in Washington City, where he served for several years as corre- 
spondent of the Times- Democrat. There, also, in 1893 he was graduated with the degree 
of Master of Laws ; then he removed to Portland, Oregon, where he is now practising 
his profession.] 

He who would build a house that all may see, 

In Truth should dig the deep foundation ways, 

And lay the corner-stone of Love, and raise 
The walls of Steadfastness ; then tenderly 
Bedeck the halls with Song and Poesy, 

And keep Contentment on the hearth ablaze ; 

The windows Hope, the ascending gables Praise, 
And over all the roof of Charity. 

Then let the tempests rage, the flames consume ; 

Time's self were impotent to seal the doom 
Of such a house, where wanderers may find, 

Blazoned in gold above the welcoming portal : 
" Who enters here leaves Hopelessness behind." 

The true home is the heart, and hence immortal. 



SIK WILLIAM THOMSON'S AEROLITH. 

BY RICHAKD NIXON. 

Gray, moss-grown fragment of a shattered world, 
Have you at last found peaceful days and rest ? 
While lying here upon the meadow's breast, 

With tender tendrils round about you curled, 

Do you forget the days and ways when, whirled 
Through awful space, you speeded in your quest 
For any shining distant sphere where best 

Life's wearied wings might be forever furled ? 

If, as one says, within your cold embrace 

There sleeps a life long nursed in unseen skies, 

When your dull weight has turned to fertile earth,. 

Will there spring forth a flower with star-born face, 
( )r strange-shaped butterfly with crystal eyes — 
A dazzling splendor of ephemeral mirth % 



SWINBURNE. 



BY KICHARD NIXON. 



Eagle of song, toward your unflinching flight 

I turn the longing of devoted gaze. 

From this dark terrene coign I catch the rays 
That blinding fall from your supernal height. 
Your wings are rhythm, and your flight is light ; 

Beyond all thought or dream of perfect praise, 

You rise to heaven through the uncertain ways 
That lie along the borderlands of night. 
Teach me the secret of your pulsing breast, 

And all its moving mysteries unfold, 

And how the magic of your might is won ; 
For now you make youth's tender heart your nest, 

And now you fiercely soar, exultant, bold, 
And gaze unblinded on the equal sun. 



WHEN ALL IS SAID. 

BY JULIA K. WETHERILL BAKER. 

When all is said — when all our words 
Of love and pleasure, one by one, 

Have taken wing and flown like birds 
That seek the Southern sun — 

Naught shall be changed. The sweet delay 
Of April dusks, the rapturous dawn, 

The glowing height of golden day, 
Shall all go on, and on. 

The birds shall shake the rosy bough 
With ecstasy of springtide song ; 

And in the meadows, then as now, 
The grass shall crowd and throng. 

There shall be flowers and flowers ! — to waste 
Along the paths where victors tread, 

( )r where the f easters singing haste ; 
And wreaths to deck the dead. 

And not the less clear streams shall run 
Through secret haunts of woodland gloom ; 

And I shall smile, as smiles the sun 
On cradle and on tomb. 

When all is said — Soul of my soul ! 

Could all be said of love's delight, 
'Twixt thee and me, though time should roll 

Beyond earth's day and night ? 



Atlantic Monthly. 



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